RESTORING THE
NATURAL WORLD
NATURAL STATE
NATURAL STATE
Catalysing global restoration by revolutionising impact monitoring, developing innovative financial mechanisms, and supporting local talent.
GLOBAL SOLUTIONS FROM AFRICA
We are helping build the foundation of the Nature-Based Solutions sector in the Global South. That means ensuring the technology, data, systems and skilled people are in place, enabling major investment in biodiversity, carbon, and local communities.
Ceciliah Mumbi, Field Researcher
NATURAL STATE RESEARCH CENTRE
The NATURAL STATE Research Centre sits at the base of Mt. Kenya surrounded by a unique combination of open grassland, shrubland, dense forest, and wetlands that are home to a diverse range of species, from elephants to warthogs to dung beetles. This land is also home to a range of land management approaches such as pastoral community conservancies, smallholder agriculture, community forest reserves, and private protected areas. We thrive in a community with several organisations testing innovative conservation and restoration initiatives.
The NATURAL STATE Research Centre has the most advanced carbon lab in Northern Kenya allowing our team state of the art technology to make headway in the sector of conservation and restoration.
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We believe new financial mechanisms for nature can be the single largest funding source for the natural world. That is why we are developing the technology and systems as well as helping build the skills base needed to catalyse the sector.
Catherine Machungo, Head of Carbon Sciences
FEATURED PROJECTS
Impact Monitoring Technology
(Kutuma & uKweli)
NATURAL STATE is helping build the foundation of the Nature-Based-Solutions sector in the tropics and subtropics by developing the technology and systems needed to rapidly set baselines and measure trends over time in biodiversity, carbon, and human wellbeing. This information will assess the success or failure of restoration interventions and compensate those that are demonstrating genuine positive impact. This will support various financial mechanisms such as bonds or credits.
Our Kutuma application rapidly ingests and sorts data from the field, primarily using remote sensors or AI. uKweli, our impact monitoring portal analyses and presents the information on an intuitive dashboard, showing trends in biodiversity, carbon, and human wellbeing. This rapid, cost-effective, and robust process addresses the lack of baseline data in the Global South. It allows for a broader range of co-benefits to be measured and rewarded and creates trust in this emerging sector as every data point has a digital footprint making it easy for third parties to audit. This system will be used in all the projects listed below.
Mt Kenya Landscape Restoration Project
NATURAL STATE is working with community and private conservancies in the Mt. Kenya Landscape to develop an integrated carbon and biodiversity credit that will sequester carbon, restore biodiversity and provide resources and benefits to the local communities. The restoration will be achieved through grazing management, assisted natural regeneration, and where relevant, tree planting. In addition to carbon, our goal is to truly measure biodiversity and community impacts, set baselines and targets, and ensure projects are properly compensated for improvements in these areas. A goal of ours is to prioritise the impact on human wellbeing and biodiversity on the same level as carbon. We believe projects that genuinely benefit the people and the planet should be properly incentivised.
Rewilding the Orange River-Karoo Landscape
NATURAL STATE is working with the Orange River-Karoo Conservation Area (ORKCA) to develop a Rewilding credit in Southern Namibia. The region is especially culturally and ecologically important, being the home of the Nama people and the intersection of critical ecosystem and biodiversity hotspot succulent Karoo, Nama Karoo, and Desert biomes. Together with local farmers and communities, ORKCA aims to restore this fragile semi-arid ecosystem by removing fences, decreasing livestock numbers, and protecting the indigenous plants and wildlife. These efforts will increase the resilience of the ecosystem and provide the foundation of a nature economy. This project has the potential to be the largest rewilding initiative in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Supporting Custodians of Nature
NATURAL STATE is working with Oxford University, Lion Landscapes, the WildCAT Trust, and local communities to develop Custodian Credits that reward nature custodianship and productive wildlife coexistence. We are starting with a focus on communities who live with lions in southern Tanzania, financially rewarding the maintenance of lion populations and their habitat using co-developed activities that promote coexistence.
The African Centre for Nature Restoration and Resilience
NATURAL STATE is creating the African Centre for Nature Restoration and Resilience in East Africa in collaboration with the Wildlife Research Training Institute of Kenya, AgWild, WildTeam, and the African Leadership University. Together, we are developing accessible, onsite and online skills-based training courses and a restoration start-up incubator to help African leaders build and run large-scale nature restoration and regenerative agriculture projects, with a particular focus on indigenous peoples and local communities, women and youth. The courses will cover subjects including project impact monitoring, accessing carbon and nature finance, and planning and implementing restoration and regenerative agriculture projects.
Local and Indigenous Knowledge
The Centre for Local and Indigenous Knowledge provides resources and space enabling local community members to document and share traditional approaches, beliefs and knowledge relating to nature restoration and regenerative agriculture, and to develop and implement strategies to increase resilience in the face of climate change. The Centre is being built at the African Centre for Nature Restoration & Resilience and will be managed by community members from the surrounding region. NATURAL STATE will support the implementation of the identified climate resilience strategies. The Centre will also provide an opportunity for intergenerational sharing of knowledge. For example, learning the traditional plant names and their cultural and medicinal importance.
XPRIZE Finals
NATURAL STATE and its partners are one of 6 teams who have qualified for the finals of the Rainforest XPRIZE, a global 5-year, $10 million competition that brings together cross-disciplinary teams to collaborate on the world's most urgent moonshots. Our team includes conservationists, Indigenous scientists, engineers, roboticists, and others - to use novel technologies to document and protect tropical biodiversity. NATURAL STATE is collaborating with Purdue University, Illinois Institute of Technology, and Morton Arboretum to develop state-of-the-art, automated systems to monitor rainforests. Our solution uses three data sources to identify key species in the rainforest landscape: 1) local and Indigenous knowledge experts, 2) remote sensing from automated drone flights and satellite data for tree canopy and landscape assessment, and 3) drone-deployed sensor packages deployed in the tree canopy to capture acoustic data, imagery, and eDNA for sequencing.
The NATURAL STATE Impact Monitoring Portal consolidates these data to automate data analysis and species classification. Our goal is to streamline the analysis and reporting of diverse data types to ensure that local communities can directly participate in and benefit from emerging nature finance markets.
NATURAL STATE RESPONSE TO THE COVID-19 CRISIS
The COVID-19 pandemic's impact on tourism exposed a critical vulnerability in conservation efforts – a heavy reliance on revenue generated by visitors. With travel restrictions, many protected areas faced financial struggles, jeopardizing the vital work of wildlife rangers.
NATURAL STATE, committed to sustainable conservation practices, recognised the immediate need to support these frontline heroes. We joined forces with Tusk Trust and the Scheinberg Relief Fund to launch the Wildlife Ranger Challenge. This global initiative showcases solidarity and raises crucial funds for ranger welfare, equipment, and training.
We're happy to support the Wildlife Ranger Challenge once again this year. Mark your calendars for Saturday, September 21st, the day participating ranger teams across Africa will compete in a coordinated 21-kilometer race across their protected areas. Stay tuned for ways to join the movement and support the brave rangers protecting Africa's wildlife.