Help Women in Kenya Confront Climate Change

Food scarcity, medicinal plants withering away, animals dying, a lack of rain to nourish crops. These are just a few of the threats Indigenous women farmers in Kenya told us about, as they face relentless drought caused by climate change on a daily basis.

In rural Kenya where these women are from, these threats continue to wreak havoc on Indigenous families and communities. They struggle to survive. But thanks to your support, we’re giving these women farmers the tools and training they need to adapt and survive. Here’s a recent example of what you help make possible.

Just last month, our on-the-ground partners at the Indigenous Information Network (IIN) led a series of water protection and sanitation trainings for more than 100 women from Narok and West Pokot counties, two communities greatly impacted by drought.

With your support, the women at the training sessions learned important strategies to combat drought. Some of the tools they learned include how to plant trees as a natural protection for local water sources, how to harvest and store rainwater, how to decontaminate water so it's safe for drinking, and more. What’s more, your support delivered 30 water storage tanks to women who participated in the trainings to bring back their communities!

Here are some photos from the trainings and water tank distribution!

Thank you so much for making this possible. With your support, women farmers in Kenya are learning to combat climate change and to ensure their families’ survival.

All photo credits (c) Indigenous Information Network

In the Enooretet community in Kenya, 10,000 people rely on the nearby Entonkai spring as their main water source – to drink, to cook with, to feed their livestock and to plant their crops.

But frequent and persistent drought caused by climate change means that water levels in the spring are dropping.
Women in the community said they had to travel farther and farther in search of clean, potable water. What’s more, children were falling ill from sharing contaminated water sources with livestock.

This community urgently needed clean water. And thanks to you, now they have it.

MADRE and our local partners, the Indigenous Information Network, recently put in a brand new, 10,000-liter water tank in the Enooretet community! Now, not only does this tank collect enough rain water for women and their families' daily use, but it's enough to supply the local school with water, too.

Thanks to your support, children are healthier. Women and girls spend less time hauling water from distant streams. And families have enough daily water to drink and to nourish their crops.

Here are a few photos from the water tank installation. Thank you for making this possible!

I’d like to introduce you to Cynthia and Edna. These bold and brilliant women are in the middle of a fight — for you and for all of us.

I was with them in Paris, where we gathered at the United Nations climate talks to push for sustainable, rights-based solutions to climate change.

Our planet’s chance for a healthy future lies in the hands of advocates like Cynthia and Edna. They are women leaders in Kenya, part of MADRE’s partner organization, the Indigenous Information Network (IIN).

Together, and through your support of MADRE, they combat climate threats in their communities. They bring clean water to villages plagued by drought. They plant tree nurseries to fight soil erosion. And they demand that Indigenous women’s solutions be heard by policymakers, from local government to world leaders.

Click here to listen to Edna’s interview with Democracy Now! She speaks on the climate challenges her community faces and about women’s innovative solutions.

“We are here to make sure that gender is included in the final climate change agreement,” Cynthia said to me. “Because as women, we are at the forefront of this crisis.”

We’ve seen too many steps backwards. The US and other policymakers have tried to remove language on human rights, Indigenous Peoples’ rights and gender equality from the agreement. But we know that these voices and solutions are essential to put us on a path towards a more sustainable future.

Want to help make sure that women’s voices like Cynthia’s and Edna’s are heard? Our policymakers won’t move unless we make them. So let’s make them! Visit www.womenclimatejustice.org to learn how you can join the global call for women’s full and equal participation.

Interested to learn more about women’s innovative solutions to climate change? Watch this video to see Lucy, director of IIN, describe how we bring clean water to drought-ravaged villages in rural Kenya.

In Kenya, severe and frequent drought triggered by climate change is wreaking havoc on the lives and livelihoods of women farmers and their families. But with your support, MADRE and the Indigenous Information Network train women to conserve and harvest rainwater.

In the Olkirreruki community, your support installed a clean water tank, the only source of potable water available during relentless drought. Women farmers now have enough water to grow their crops. What's more, cases of waterborne disease have dramatically decreased. Thanks to you, women farmers have access to clean water, improving health and seeing families through drought.

Thank you for supporting this vital project!

Lucy Mulenkei is the leader of the Indigenous Information Network (IIN), MADRE’s partner organization in Kenya. Together, we train rural women to confront drought and other impacts of climate change. We give them the tools to harvest rainwater, store food, and more. Here’s what Lucy had to say about why we must conserve water. We're also sharing a new on-the-ground photo from our water projects!

“The only way to keep peace in the world, and especially among communities, is to ensure that we come with solutions to provide them with water. And when we look at water, we look at water in different ways. Not only to provide that water. Communities must also be able to make sure that they know how to look after it, they know how to conserve it, and that measures can be taken to put technologies in place to ensure storage of water. This is very, very important.

"During the rainy season, we see a lot of water, everybody’s celebrating. Then the dry seasons come back and there’s no water. Conflict starts. How can we ensure to have that water storage, preservation and conservation? So that we can make sure there is peace all the time, children are happy all the time, there’s good health for the community, for the mothers, for the children, and for the livestock?

"I come from a livestock community, so that is always a priority. You don’t want to have milk from a cow that is not healthy. You want the cow to get clean water, so that they don’t get worms and they also give you fresh and good milk. So we come up with solutions. I like that it’s time to have solutions. It’s time to have action.”

Thank you for taking action through your support of this project! With your backing, we’re helping rural women farmers to conserve water and ensure their families’ survival. Thank you!