IELRC.ORG - East Africa
 
 
 
Research Areas Africa

 1: biodiversity & biosafety
 2: biotechnology
 3: intellectual property
 4: governance
 5: gender

Special African Dossier
  Wildlife

Kenya Office

Kenya is a strategically important country in the Greater Horn of Africa Region. The location of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) headquarters in Nairobi has catapulted environmental law issues to a high level of importance.

IELRC Kenya seeks to address environmental issues from a national and international perspective. Given the proliferation of international environmental agreements and Kenya’s membership thereto, IELRC’s discourse links local and national issues to the global arena.

Besides research on the environment, the Kenya office of the IELRC carries out research on gender issues, biotechnology and intellectual property rights. We link the discourses in the different fields to have a synergistic frame of reference. Consequently, access to environmental resources for women is as much our concern as access to new technologies by developing countries and communities of farmers.

The focus in the environmental law area is on:

  • Law and the management of biological diversity;
  • Property rights and environmental resources;
  • The role of international environmental agreements on land and resource rights;
  • Environment, conflict and cooperation;
  • The role of civil society in the management of transboundary water resources focusing on the River Nile;
  • Mapping the Environment Dynamic of the Conflict in the Great Lakes Region;
  • Access to justice in environmental decision-making;
  • and Wildlife law and policy.

The focus on gender issues is on:

  • Engendering law and policy reform;
  • Access, Control and Ownership of Land and Resources;
  • Challenging the Dominant Discourse and Changing Paradigms on Women’s Rights to Land and Resources;
  • The interface between formal and informal norm-creating and enforcing institutions and their impact on women’s rights in agricultural and pastoral communities.

The focus on biotechnology is on:

  • The impact of intellectual property protection and access to biotechnology for small scale farmers;
  • Regulatory frameworks for Genetically Modified Organisms in African countries;
  • and Legal frameworks for liability and redress in biotechnology research, development and commercialisation in Africa.

Patricia Kameri-Mbote
Programme Director
East Africa

Recent Publications
 

Kenya: Justice Sector and the Rule of Law
author(s): Patricia Kameri Mbote & Migai Akech
source: Johannesburg: Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa
date: 2011
publication: academic
abstract full text 1994 [KB]
 

Courts as Champions of Sustainable Development: Lessons from East Africa
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote and Collins Odote
source: 10/1 Sustainable Development Law & Policy (2009), p. 30-8, 83-4
date: 2009
publication: academic
abstract full text 547 [KB]
 

Water and Food Security in the Nile River Basin: Perspectives of Governments and NGOs of Upstream Countries
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote and Kithure Kindiki
source: in H.G. Brauch, P. Kameri-Mbote et al. eds, Facing Global Environmental Change - Environmental, Human, Energy, Food, Health and Water Security Concepts (Springer, 2009), p. 651-59
date: 2009
publication: academic
abstract full text 1429 [KB]
 

Kenya (Role of the Judiciary in Environmental Governance)
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote
source: L.J. Kotze & A.R. Paterson eds, The Role of the Judiciary in Environmental Governance: Comparative Perspectives (Kluwer Law International, 2009), p. 451-78
date: 2009
publication: academic
abstract full text 1965 [KB]
 

Trouble in Eden: How and Why Unresolved Land Issues Landed ‘Peace-full Kenya’ in Trouble in 2008
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote & Kithure Kindiki
source: 35 Forum for Development Studies (2008), p. 167-93
date: 2008
publication: academic
abstract full text 1713 [KB]
 

Separating The Baby From the Bath Water: Women's Rights and the Politics of Constitution-Making in Kenya
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote & N. Kabira
source: 14/1 East African Journal of Peace and Human Rights (2008), p. 1-43.
date: 2008
publication: academic
abstract full text 2546 [KB]
 

Following God's Constitution: The Gender Dimension in the Ogiek Claim to Mau Forest Complex
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote & Jacinta Anyango Oduor
source: in Anne Hellum et. al, Paths are Made by Walking: Human Rights Interfacing Gendered Realities and Plural Legalities (Harare: Weaver Press, 2006).
date: 2006
publication: academic
abstract full text 99 [KB]
 

Women, Land Rights and the Environment: The Kenyan Experience
author(s): Patricia Kameri-Mbote
source: 49(3) Development (2006), p. 43-48.
date: 2006
publication: academic
abstract full text 97 [KB]
 
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