From Drought to Common Ground: Mukutan Conservancy's Community Grazing Story
- Gilbert Kirgotty
- Jul 14
- 4 min read
Since 2022, a shared approach to grazing has helped protect livelihoods, create jobs, strengthen relationships and demonstrate that livestock and wildlife can thrive on the same landscape.
“We used to steal from each other. Now we don’t. We saw that it only brings losses.”
-Loktari Silale, a farmer from the Luoniek area
For Loktari Silale, these words describe one of the most important changes brought about by Mukutan Conservancy’s Community Cattle Grazing Programme. The impact is visible in the cattle grazing across the conservancy, but it can also be felt in the relationships between neighbouring communities, the jobs created for local families and the growing belief that conservation can work for both people and wildlife.
A shared response to drought
In 2022, Laikipia was among the Kenyan counties experiencing an exceptionally severe drought. The National Drought Management Authority classified Laikipia in the Alarm drought phase, as failed rains left pastoralist families facing shrinking supplies of pasture and water.
For these families, cattle are not simply an economic asset. They support food security, school fees, cultural identity and a family’s future.
In November 2022, Mukutan opened designated grazing areas within the conservancy to cattle from neighbouring communities. What began as an urgent response to drought soon became something much bigger: an opportunity to manage grazing together, reduce competition over limited natural resources and build greater trust across the landscape.
How the programme works
The programme is managed in close partnership with the communities through MSHIPI, Mukutan’s community council. MSHIPI brings together representatives from six neighbouring zones and gives communities a direct role in communication, decision-making and accountability.
Cattle do not graze wherever or whenever they choose. Designated areas, agreed grazing plans, and controlled livestock movement help prevent overuse and allow sections of the rangeland time to recover. Community members employed as herders guide the cattle, monitor grazing areas and help maintain the balance between livestock, wildlife and the land.
Mukutan Conservancy, as an institution, does not keep its own cattle. Instead, 100% of the conservancy’s grassbank is dedicated to wildlife and supporting community livestock through carefully managed grazing and related livestock initiatives.
This makes the programme more than an arrangement for accessing pasture. It is a shared commitment to caring for the same landscape.
Growing together
Participation has continued to grow since the programme began:
Year | Number of cattle in the program |
2024 | 5,000 |
2025 | 6,000 |
Mid-2026 | 7,000+ |
The number of registered calves also grew from 2,270 in November 2024 to 4,994 in September 2025, an increase of approximately 120%. Presently by mid-2026, there are over 3,000 calves in the program. These figures are not simply measures of programme growth. Behind them are families who have been able to protect their cattle, maintain an important source of livelihood and face difficult seasons with greater support.
More than grazing
The benefits of the programme extend well beyond access to grass and water.
Today, more than 170 people benefit from jobs created through the initiative, including community herders, supervisors, and night guards who manage livestock movement and help the programme operate responsibly.
This employment supports households directly. It also reduces the need for children to spend their days moving with cattle in search of pasture. With adults employed to manage the herds, more children have the opportunity to remain in school.
The programme has also contributed to Mukutan’s wider work of building peace through conservation.
Communities that once competed over scarce pasture now participate in a shared system with agreed rules and a common interest in protecting the land. Loktari’s words speak plainly to that change: conflict brought losses, while cooperation has created opportunities.
In the video below, community members share how managed grazing has affected their cattle, their families and their relationships with one another.
Where cattle and conservation coexist
Conservation and grazing are sometimes presented as competing uses of land. Mukutan’s experience is showing that they can support one another when grazing is carefully planned and communities are part of the process.
Controlled grazing helps reduce pressure on fragile areas, gives vegetation time to recover and ensures that the conservancy’s grassbank can continue supporting wildlife and community livestock. The herders working within the programme also help monitor the landscape and maintain safe, coordinated movement alongside wildlife.
This does not mean that every challenge has disappeared. Rainfall remains unpredictable, pasture must be managed carefully, and the programme depends on continued cooperation.
What it demonstrates is that conservation does not have to exclude the people living around a protected landscape. With the right structures in place, it can protect nature while strengthening livelihoods.
Looking ahead
What began as drought relief in 2022 has grown into one of Mukutan’s most important community programmes. It now supports thousands of cattle, enables more than 170 people to benefit from jobs created through the initiative and brings neighbouring communities together around the responsible use of a shared landscape.
Its future will continue to be shaped together with the MSHIPI committee, participating farmers, community herders and local leaders. As climate pressures continue to affect Laikipia’s and Baringo's pastoralist communities, those partnerships will be essential to protecting both livelihoods and the land on which they depend.
At Mukutan Conservancy, we believe that a healthy landscape should create opportunities for the people who live alongside it. The Community Cattle Grazing Programme is one example of that belief in action: cattle, communities and wildlife sharing the same landscape, and all benefiting when it is cared for together.
Help us keep community-led conservation growing.
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