Better Globe Forestry Limited

BETTER GLOBE FORESTRY (Ltd)

Better Globe Forestry (BGF) Ltd was incorporated in Kenya in 2004 and in Uganda in 2009 with the vision to eradicate poverty and corruption in Africa. Its mission, through ‘Social Entrepreneurship’, is to plant as many trees as there are people on this planet, and thereby finance a sustainable implementation of the vision.

BGF’s core expertise lies in commercial dryland afforestation and in-depth knowledge of living and environmental conditions in semi-arid areas. As such, it is well positioned to anticipate and mitigate effects of climate change in East Africa, in a commercially sustainable way.

The company’s head office is in Nairobi, Kenya. Field operations in Kenya are located in Kiambere, Seven Forks, and Sosoma areas of Kitui County, and in Nyongoro in Lamu County. In Uganda, the company operates in Dokolo and surrounding districts in the northern part of the country.

The company is strongly embedded in the East African society, through its policies of employment and promotion of local staff, up to senior level, its integration in forestry circles, and its sharing of technical knowledge of dryland afforestation with interested parties. In addition, Miti, the company’s well-known forestry magazine, serves as a networking platform for forestry professionals and non-professionals alike.
BGF currently employs 170 members of staff, and 300 – 400 casual workers, depending on the season. As a policy, we offer career opportunities to young graduates of local learning institutions such as Eldoret University and Londiani Forestry College. On field sites like Kiambere, a large percentage of our workers are women. Farmer programmes are deeply rooted in the local communities, with an ever-growing number of community representatives attached to ‘their’ agroforestry agent.

Working with the Kenya Forestry Research Institute (KEFRI), BGF has pioneered the use of an indigenous mahogany species, Melia volkensii (locally known as mukau), on an industrial scale. We have introduced and popularised the planting of this melia in an authentic and productive agroforestry layout for tens of thousands of farmers.

Our plantations are divided into two categories:

• classic tree plantations on leased land, and
• Trees planted with partner-farmers on their land, with wide spacing to allow intercropping with food crops.

We support farmers through tree donations and access to micro-credit and water supply works.
The advantages of working with farmers are obvious: no cumbersome lease agreements or land deals, no investment in heavy machinery, farmers can continue to farm their land for food crops grown alongside the trees, and lastly, farmers are MANY.

Quality Policy
Better Globe Forestry is committed to complying with its obligations to investors, employees, suppliers, customers, shareholders, partners, and any other present or future stakeholders. In doing this, the company uses a Quality Approach that takes care of the environment and the community at large.
We, the management and employees of Better Globe Forestry, proudly pronounce our commitment to understanding, meeting, and, when possible, exceeding the expectations of our stakeholders through the continuous improvement of our processes. We are dedicated to planting and maintaining trees that allow us to achieve our vision and mission and, at the same time, give a return on investment for our stakeholders.

It is therefore the policy of BGF to :

• At all times aim at achieving the financial goals and objectives, make sound financial decisions, report the financial status of BGF, and manage BGF’s funds prudently.
• Continuously identify and address the needs of employees, suppliers, customers, shareholders, the community at large, and any other stakeholders,
• Fight poverty, through promoting massive tree planting and fighting corruption by supporting children’s education through the NGO Child Africa.
• Motivate and keep staff motivated to meet the company’s business objectives.
• Ensure that personnel throughout the organisation are committed to Better Globe Forestry’s Management Aims and Policies through on-going training and education programmes.
• Establish, maintain, and improve employee knowledge and compliance with environmental, health and safety requirements so as not to jeopardise individual and corporate safety.
• Through monitoring and evaluation, have a systematic and objective assessment of every on-going or completed project, programme or policy, its standard, design, implementation, and results.
• Continuously strengthen everyone’s commitment to environmental improvement most effectively and efficiently. This is to be achieved by ensuring that management behaviour, image, communication, and recognition systems reflect the norms and values that support integrity and continuous improvement.

Business principles

1. To continuously identify the present and future needs of the stakeholders.
2. To establish the leadership needed to provide unity of purpose and direction of the company, and to create an atmosphere where people give their best to achieve company objectives.
3. To manage resources to maximum efficiency.
4. To strive for continuous improvement of the company’s performance.
5. To maintain a mutually beneficial relationship with our partner-farmers.
6. To plant and maintain trees in a professional and sustainable way as expected by our investors.

Operational model
This involves the vertical integration of all activities, from seed and seedling production, to plantation establishment, maintenance, and exploitation, to processing in our own plants, completed by marketing and sales. BGF only plants high-value species that offer significant returns on processing.

Growth & Expansion Strategy

• We cooperate with relevant institutions (see “Partner Organisations”) through memoranda of understanding (MOUs), research, micro-credit, and educational activities.
• We use improved seeds from seed orchards and clones through in-vitro multiplication of Melia volkensii in our facility at Kamburu (see “Kamburu programme”).
• The mechanisation of operations where it is suitable. We use bulldozers for clearing, tractors for various operations, drills for making pits, standard agricultural boom sprayers for weeding, and custom-designed watering equipment (see “Nyongoro plantation”). We also use locally engineered and manufactured trailers for log haulage (under preparation for the “Sawmill and Value Adding Programme”).
• Priority is given to local staff at recruiting, and community representatives are trusted local farmers who know their community and have a passion for tree planting. This network is continuously expanding, in keeping with the extension of the farmers’ programmes, both in Kenya and Uganda. We strive to have a low turnover of personnel to build up in-depth technical and administrative knowledge and avoid disrupting our operations.
• We integrate farmer out-reach and large-scale seedling production with capacity building and micro-credit.
  • For example, the area of Seven Forks touches parts of Kitui, Machakos, and Embu counties of Kenya. Here we run our farmers programme with its training component, the Green Initiative Challenge (see under “Realisations”), which involves hundreds of schools, several village banks and the tree nursery at the Kiambere plantation.
  • Another example is our farmers operation in northern Uganda (see “Northern Uganda farmers programme”), where a similar farmers programme is taking place, with a large-scale nursery and a support programme for a local farmers association (YICAFA).
• The farmer programmes both at Seven Forks and northern Uganda will be given priority as Better Globe Forestry strongly believes in working with farmers, and that agroforestry offers the best future use of land in rural areas. Both programmes are considered centres for expansion.
  • In Uganda, this is up north towards the border with South Sudan, where land and ecological conditions are relatively uniform and suitable for extending our current operations.
  • In the case of Seven Forks, it is to the east and the south, reaching out to vast stretches of sparsely populated semi-arid drylands.