03/10/2026
What happens when communities managing very different landscapes sit down to compare what works?
This week, conservancy managers, rangeland coordinators and other representatives from the 22 NRT member conservancies participating in the Northern Kenya Rangelands Carbon Project travelled to Narok County for a learning and exposure visit to the Greater Mara ecosystem.
Many of the conversations were very familiar to our teams: from community governance to sustainable grazing, while others offered ideas worth thinking about back home.
At Mara Naboisho Conservancy, the team looked at a community conservation model built around land, wildlife, tourism and livelihoods. Like many conservancies in the Mara landscape, Naboisho has built its model around a “Landowner-Investor” partnership, where individual families voluntarily pool their private land parcels into a collective conservation area, linking land ownership, conservation and tourism.
A key part of that model is high-value, low-impact tourism, with tourism operators contributing through conservancy and bed-night fees that help sustain conservation and generate benefits for local communities. What stood out was how closely conservation and livelihoods are connected: tourism provides income for landowners while supporting education and other community priorities.
The team also learnt how landowners participate in the conservancy, how grazing is managed, and how governance structures help communities make decisions around their shared resources.
The exchange also opened a two-way conversation around carbon. While carbon sequestration is still relatively new for a lot of conservancies in the Mara, their teams have previously looked to NRT and the NKRCP to learn from our experience in managing the world’s largest soil carbon removal project. For our own teams, that exchange was a reminder that learning can move in both directions: each landscape has its own unique experience, questions and ideas to share.
The learning continued at Pardamat Conservation Area, Maasai Mara (PCA), where the team encountered another approach to organising conservation, livelihoods and wildlife. Unlike models in the Mara that set aside distinct areas primarily for wildlife, Pardamat follows a mixed conservation model in which communities, livestock and wildlife share the landscape, offering a different yet familiar perspective on how conservation and pastoral livelihoods can coexist.
The team also visited the Wildlife Tourism College of Maasai Mara, located within Pardamat. The college combines vocational training, conservation and tourism with research and educational visits, equipping young people with skills in areas such as tour guiding, hospitality and wildlife management. Its educational tourism model also generates income for landowners through visiting student researchers and eco-guest payments, linking skills development with local livelihoods.
Across the different places visited, our teams asked questions, compared experiences and considered what lessons might translate to northern Kenya—from tourism revenue mechanisms and grazing approaches to governance and community benefits.
Perhaps the strongest lesson was broader than any one idea: long-term community-led conservation needs systems that can stand on their own. External support can help communities build institutions and opportunities, but lasting change depends on strong community governance, sustainable livelihoods, healthy ecosystems and income streams that can continue serving people and landscapes for generations.
The visit concluded in the Maasai Mara National Reserve, bringing the learning experience full circle—from conversations about how communities manage landscapes to seeing the wildlife and ecosystems those efforts ultimately help protect.
There may be no single model to copy. But there is always something to learn, adapt and carry home.
