Updates on Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project

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Updates from the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project

Wildlife Works Statement – Updates from the Kasigau Project November 2024

Since our last update in April 2024, the Kasigau team has made substantial strides in creating a safer, more equitable, and inclusive workplace. A key achievement during this period has been the successful completion of a series of customized, in-person training sessions facilitated by seasoned professionals with expertise in preventing sexual harassment and advancing gender equity.

After an extensive selection process, a workplace culture and wellness consulting firm and an individual gender equity consultant were engaged to design and facilitate customized workshops for all 450 team members.

The first workshop, conducted in February, focused on understanding and identifying harassment and preventing it in the workplace. Based on the success and overwhelming expression of interest voiced from the participants, the staff themselves requested more training. Additional sessions were held in August to reinforce and deepen the understanding of concepts covered in the first workshop, bring awareness of the company’s policy of zero tolerance for any form of harassment, and to foster accountability. These efforts had a profound impact, raising awareness among staff members about critical issues often overlooked due to cultural norms.

Building on this success, a training series on gender equality and equity was launched in September 2024, led by the gender consultant. Over three weeks, the day-long sessions provided staff with the knowledge and skills needed to effectively address gender-related challenges. Following the completion of the intensive workshops, sixteen participants were selected for their exceptional engagement to join the Kasigau Gender Equity and Social Inclusion Committee. This committee now comprises 18 members, ensuring equal representation across genders and departments. The group held its inaugural meeting in November 2024 and will continue to convene monthly.

Our commitment to addressing harassment and supporting equity is ongoing. One year ago, a certified Kenyan psychological counselor conducted listening sessions with all staff, laying the foundation for sustained support for those affected by workplace harassment. These sessions also helped identify risk factors for sexual offenses.

In January and March 2024, comprehensive reviews of our policies were conducted by the Interim HR Manager and then in conjunction with the Policy Review Committee. Key updates were made to the Human Resource Manual, Sexual Harassment Policy, and Grievance Policy. These policies reflect our commitment to workplace safety and dignity and are being shared through in-house training to ensure all staff fully understand their purpose and implications. The newly appointed HR Manager, Florence M. Fundi is overseeing this process.

A new Staff Grievance Committee, with equal gender representation, was formed to handle concerns transparently. Members, elected by their peers, review submissions from seven secure, strategically placed suggestion boxes every two months. Each box can only be accessed when the keys, held individually by the Project Lead and HR Manager, are used together to open it. Staff can also approach the committee or individual members at any time for support.

We are also pleased to share the promotion of Joseph Mwambiti to Head Ranger, as well as the promotion of Constance Mwandaa to Head of Training and Assistant Warden. Learn more about Constance’s story in this short film.

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

At the community level, the introduction of ongoing town hall meetings in January 2024, alongside other established engagement events, has created an open forum for addressing grievances and fostering collaboration. These meetings are attended by local leaders and community members, ensuring accessible pathways for dialogue and resolution.

The Local Carbon Committees (LCCs) serve as the governance structures responsible for directing project spending in the Kasigau project area (read more about LCCs). Each of the six community locations within the project area has its own LCC, with members elected by the local community to ensure representation and accountability. To enhance transparency and address concerns effectively, each LCC satellite office has been equipped with new secure suggestion boxes.

These boxes are reviewed monthly by the Disbursement Committee, following strict security protocols: one set of keys is held by the respective LCC Project Manager, and the other by a Wildlife Works Community Relations Department member. The boxes can only be opened when both key holders are present. Communities are encouraged to continue bringing their concerns directly to their LCC offices at any time, without having to wait for scheduled meetings to receive support or attention.

Additionally, the Biodiversity SBIA workshops, held regularly since 2011, continue to address community risks and support biodiversity conservation.

Stay on top of community member personal accounts and project impacts on the Wildlife Works' blog, and Kasigau project page. Watch and read a sampling of testimonials from community partners and locally hired employees on the impact of the project on their lives: WATCH | READ Taita Taveta residents protest over withdrawal of carbon credit project - The Standard

GLOBAL LEVEL

To strengthen anonymous reporting mechanisms, Wildlife Works partnered with Navex EthicsPoint, a trusted provider of confidential reporting systems. Implementation began in June, with manager training completed in October and staff training in November. The system will provide a secure and confidential means for reporting incidents and will be accessible to all Wildlife Works employees worldwide.

The Global Gender Rights Task Force (GGRTF) is driving awareness and reinforcing Wildlife Works’ zero-tolerance policy for harassment of any kind. Its mission is to cultivate a respectful and inclusive global workplace culture that enables all staff to thrive. The GGRTF includes members representing all global regional offices of Wildlife Works; Kenya, the DRC, Colombia, Brazil, Indonesia, Cambodia, as well as corporate staff from the U.S. and Europe.

Since its formal launch in February 2024, the GGRTF has convened 18 collaborative meetings. The Task Force has made significant progress by launching a diversity, equity, inclusion, and harassment baseline survey available in six languages, implementing the Navex anonymous whistleblower system, and conducting a thorough review of internal policies and relevant policy review.

Additionally, it is organizing focus groups to gather lived-experience feedback on the company’s stated values, commitments, and beliefs. These efforts aim to develop a robust philosophical framework to guide equity-and harassment-related policy enforcement and training. The survey results, along with the policy and framework reviews will inform and bolster the training efforts implemented by Symmetra Global, a newly contracted specialist consultancy with worldwide expertise in fostering engaged leadership for equitable workplace culture.

The responsibilities of the GGRTF members are:

Identify and map local needs to create and maintain safe and respectful work environments in all regions we support and develop plans, strategies, and initiatives to meet those needs.
Serve as organizational champions and commit to leading practical actions to accelerate change.
Provide employees with an open and safe channel of communication on anything related to gender equity and workplace culture.
Initiate a network to engage male leaders for gender equality.
Intensify efforts to recruit, promote, and retain women.

In October 2024, Wildlife Works launched bias sensitivity training for all managers globally, marking a significant step toward fostering awareness and inclusivity among company leaders. This training is the first in what will become a regular initiative to promote sensitivity and awareness at all leadership levels. In 2025, the program will expand to include all employees, with tailored sessions designed to address the specific needs of staff living and working in project areas.

Wildlife Works remains steadfast in its commitment to gender equity and zero tolerance for harassment and violence. These efforts are not mere formalities but integral to fostering an organizational culture aligned with our core values. We will continue to refine policies, encourage open dialogue, and promote upward feedback to ensure accountability and inclusivity. Through these actions, we aim to strengthen the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project for the long-term benefit of all stakeholders, creating a model for equity and respect in workplace and community engagement.

PREVIOUS UPDATES:

Wildlife Works Statement – Updates from the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project : April 19, 2024

We are pleased to report on the latest progress on gender equality at Kasigau in our commitment to continued improvement.

The Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project Gender Equity group kicked off its initial formation meeting and currently comprises a core team of five women, headed by one who is also part of the global gender task force. The Kasigau Project Gender Equity team is currently recruiting a third-party specialist who will assist in the establishment of the committee, its terms of reference, goals, objectives, and training needs.

The recruitment of a replacement Human Resource Manager has concluded. This process was guided and supported by a Nairobi-based human resources consulting firm with a focus on culture and employee wellness. Out of 70 applications received, the hiring panel (comprising 5 people from different departments including the project lead and one person from the consulting firm) produced a shortlist of five qualified Kenyan women candidates. After interviews in early March, an offer was issued to the favored candidate who accepted and will commence her role in May 2024.

The KCRP Grievance Committee panel has now been established in full. The committee is governed by its own policy and terms of reference and is composed of 15 members – one elected from each department and sharing an equal gender balance. This group is not only to serve all staff at any given time if there is a grievance to be heard, but more importantly to regularly attend to the 7 suggestion boxes placed around Wildlife Works workstations. These are opened on the last Tuesday of every 2nd month and the committee meets on the 1st Wednesday of the following month to go through all comments. The grievances are recorded, deliberated, and feedback is issued to all staff via an official memo for general grievances. For individual and more sensitive grievances these are handled directly with the staff member. Three meetings have taken place since the new committee was implemented.

A policy review committee has been set up with members from each department. All policies have been reviewed and amended to close the gaps. These revised policies have been sent to relevant senior global management for review. Once signed off, training sessions will be implemented for the entire KCRP staff.

The Global Gender Equity Task Force has been meeting twice per month since its formation in February. It currently comprises 12 individuals from all regions including the countries of Cambodia, Indonesia, Kenya, DRC, Colombia, UK and US. Its composition represents functional areas of HR, Operations, Policy, Community Engagement, Communications, and Carbon Development. It is diverse in terms of race, gender, levels of the organization, and tenure with the company. The first key activities have commenced:

Gathering of relevant policies globally for comparison and baselining
Non-Harassment training
Evaluating proposals from three gender consultants who can provide services such as policy review, training design and delivery, surveys and focus groups, grievance reporting design, etc.
Designing of a survey to benchmark existing staff perceptions on feelings about inclusion, equity, sexual or other workplace harassment

We appreciate this opportunity to improve the way we work and to ensure we are acting on our values with the highest integrity and transparency. We thank all of our supporters throughout the years, especially our community partners who have trusted us on this journey to battle climate change as a global community.

Wildlife Works Statement – Updates from the Kasigau Project February 12, 2024

We promised we would keep you updated on the work we have been doing to remedy the situation at our Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project. Throughout December and January we held numerous community outreach meetings to continue to listen to what the community has to say about the project as well as to explain to the community what we have been doing to regain their trust and that of our employees. These meetings were very successful and have renewed our determination to improve and expand the Kasigau project. We were very appreciative of the community spending their time to inform us of their views on the project and the ways that they would like to see it improve for them.

Not only did we meet with the community ourselves, but in December, several community leaders came together of their own volition to form new grievance committees to ensure that there are no violations occurring outside the company in the local community. We have welcomed this initiative and have started working alongside these committees to ensure that they also continue to hold us to account.

The committees held their own investigations and reviewed the list of grievances alleged in the SOMO report. We are pleased to note that their findings were consistent with those of our formal investigation and many of the very serious allegations made by SOMO were unfounded. The main community committee has themselves written directly to SOMO with their findings.

As part of our commitment to the community we will continue to hold regular meetings with them in the future.

The community’s findings and their support for the Kasigau project have been reported on here:

VOI RESIDENTS DENIES RAPE ALLEGATIONS BY STAFFS OF REDD+ PROJECT BY WILDLIFE WORKS COMPANY IN MAUNGU

Red plus project: Allegations raised against World Life Works in Taita Taveta

Taita Taveta residents protest over withdrawal of carbon credit project - The Standard

*please note the coverage mistakenly states that 10 employees (instead of 2) have been terminated.

We would also like to express our gratitude to the Governor of Taita Taveta County, His Excellency Mr Andrew Mwadime who has also spoken publicly in support of the Kasigau Project after he himself visited the project to assess whether we were taking appropriate steps to remedy the situation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVgwX7YCneg

Our commitment to helping the community and to ensuring that the project continues is of the utmost importance to us and we will continue to do everything in our power to keep supporting the community and improving the project for the benefit of all.

As well as our ongoing work with the community, we are continuing to make progress internally including:

An interim HR consultant is conducting a full audit of Kasigau’s processes and procedures.
We have contracted with a local, culturally-appropriate firm to conduct gender sensitivity and sexual harassment training for all Kasigau Project management, staff and contractors. This initial training will be performed in February and will be repeated annually.
We are in the process of forming a Kasigau project gender equity task force, which will be replicated at our other projects.
We have formed a Global Gender Equity Task Force with representation from all of our regions to oversee project specific task forces.
We are designing and implementing new mitigation mechanisms in our grievance procedures that are needed to address risks identified by the gender equity task forces.
We will conduct company-wide management sensitivity and accountability training
We have initiated weekly Kasigau Project Heads of Department meetings to improve communications and to address any specific internal grievances that have come forth through the listening sessions as well as our new grievance reporting process.

On February 1, 2024, Verra lifted their hold on our Kaisgau Project.

Please continue to follow our improvement journey here on this page. As always, ee are open to answering any questions or listening to suggestions please email:

press at wildlifeworks dot com or contact us.

Wildlife Works Statement – Updates from the Kasigau Project

December 15th 2023

A lot of work has been taking place at our Kasigau project these past few weeks and we wanted to update and reassure the public, our partners, and stakeholders of the efforts we have been making to regain the trust of our employees and the wider Kasigau community.

Since the two members of staff (the head of security and the HR manager) who were found to be the perpetrators of the misconduct were terminated three weeks ago following the results of the third-party investigation into the project, a counselor has been on site to speak with every employee at the project and help them through this time. As well as counseling sessions, she has also been carrying out training sessions for senior managers and these sessions – both the training and company-wide counseling - will continue to take place three times a year going forward.

Our CEO Mike Korchinsky has also been at the Kasigau project with the women directly affected to apologize and find a remedy that they are happy with. He has also met with every other employee at the project to apologize and reassure them that we are doing everything we can to ensure that the project can continue and that 428 vital jobs are not lost.

Similarly, we have met with community representatives to hear their perspectives and reassure them of our commitment to the project. The Kasigau project protects 200,000 hectares of dryland forest and works with around 100,000 community members who benefit from the project by way of bursaries, clean water conservation projects, new schools, a diagnostic health laboratory and the mitigation of human-wildlife conflict. We are determined to ensure that these benefits are also not lost.

Our training going forward is going to focus on accountability at Kasigau and at all levels of the company as well as employee empowerment and trust. On top of this, the counselor has been working with the employees to understand what methods they feel comfortable with to report grievances and we will be tailor-making a new employee grievance process to ensure that we do not miss any future issues that could arise in a workforce of this size. We have also hired a safeguarding and HR specialist firm to continue working on our policies and procedures.

We have created a new global gender equity task force and they have started their meetings this week with the aim of developing and delivering company-wide training on gender-related issues.

We want to publicly thank our employees and the community for their continued support during this difficult time. The outpouring of support from the community has been especially comforting. It is clear from our conversations that the communities are not allowing the actions of those individuals who have now been terminated to distract them from the valuable role that Wildlife Works has played in Kasigau for over 20 years.

As we continue to progress on our journey of bringing about long-term and lasting positive change, we will be fully transparent about our progress on this journey and will continue to update you.

We are open to answering any questions or listening to suggestions please email:

press at wildlifeworks dot com

Wildlife Works Statement – Updates from the Kasigau Project November 20, 2023

Following an extensive independent third-party investigation, Wildlife Works has terminated the head of security at our Kasigau Corridor project for gross misconduct, including conduct in violation of the company’s policy against sexual harassment. Our internal investigation is continuing in order to establish the circumstances surrounding all the allegations and to open a safe network for our employees to come forward with any further information.

We also terminated the HR manager on the basis that he created a culture of fear and intimidation that, according to interviewed personnel, prevented reporting of sexual harassment incidents. These individuals had previously been suspended immediately following our receipt of a letter from Somo in August 2023.

We firmly condemn these individuals’ behaviours. We sincerely apologize to the women and families directly affected, all our employees, our stakeholder communities in Kenya and our customers and partners around the world.

We realize that it is our responsibility to do more than apologize. We are committed to learning from this experience to ensure such behaviours never occur again in any of our projects around the world.

We have hired a female Kenyan counselor who is on site for several weeks to conduct listening sessions with staff and to provide ongoing support for the women affected as well as all employees who wish to speak with her. Part of this healing process will be to provide effective remediation to the women in our company and in the community who were directly affected.

We will not stop there. We need to continue to rebuild trust with our employees, the community who rely on the revenue from the sale of carbon credits for many essential community development needs, the customers who buy those credits, and the wider public. For this, we are committed to do the hard work to continue bringing about long-term and lasting positive change.

Beyond our zero tolerance policy, we are committed to ensuring a safe workplace with effective and anonymous reporting mechanisms. In addition to hiring Kenyan experts to help us create new processes, we have been holding a series of internal grievance meetings to understand from our employees how we can improve the way we work with them and our partner communities on safeguarding measures. The counselor will also be auditing our policies and procedures and assisting in the creation of our future grievance and human resources reporting policies. Already these actions have been productive.

We are in the process of forming a gender steering committee for the project whose members will be decided by the female staff. They will play a pivotal role in designing company policies and our ongoing engagement of gender rights specialists.

We will also be undertaking leadership and accountability training at all levels of the company.

Finally, out of an abundance of caution and concern, we will be carrying out independent investigations at our other global project sites and regional offices to make sure we go above and beyond the international safeguarding standards.

We have always believed in radical transparency and that includes being willing to talk openly about what happened and remediate it, very firmly and rigourously. In that spirit we will be fully transparent about our progress on this journey and will continue to update you.

We are open to answering any questions or listening to suggestions. Please contact us: or email at press at wildlifeworks dot com