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Tips to Save the Planet with Natural Conservation: A Beginner's Guide

The world is fast-forwarding towards an era of digitalization and urbanization. Both of these developments have drastically changed the way we live and work. As a result, more and more people are seeking greener alternatives to minimize the impact on the environment. Natural Conservation is one such choice that offers benefits without harming the planet. It is an offshoot of environmentalism and ecotourism that focuses on preserving nature for future generations. Here’s everything you need to know about natural conservation and its impact on the environment.

What is Natural Conservation?

The practice of natural conservation focuses on the conservation of natural environments and activities that promote environmental health. It helps to maintain, preserve, protect and restore ecosystems, habitats and species. Ecotourism is meant to conserve and protect the natural world's resources while also providing opportunities for people to travel in nature while having an economic impact on the communities in which they visit.

Natural Conservation focuses on preserving sacred forests for future generations by helping create a sustainable environment where humans can co-exist with nature. This includes conserving biological diversity and minimizing the human impact on the planet by acting as stewards of the land.

Why is Natural Conservation Important?

The world is fast-forwarding towards an era of digitalization and urbanization. Natural Conservation is a practice that offers benefits without harming the planet. It’s important to note that natural conservation is not just about planting trees or saving animals from extinction; it's about having a more sustainable relationship with nature.

What does natural conservation look like?

A common misconception about natural conservation is that it is limited to the act of planting trees or saving endangered species from extinction. However, this is only one aspect of natural conservation and there are many different ways to implement these practices in your own life on a small scale. For example, you could use leaf blowers sparingly instead of using them all the time when you mow your lawn, or you could plant native plants in your garden rather than invasive plants that destroy the surrounding environment. Another way you can protect natural pockets of land is by buying, or gifting a Sacred Groves cluster, so you and your loved ones can safeguard wildlands from commercial use.

Types of Natural Conservation

There are three types of natural conservation:

Preserving nature

Conserving resources

Eco-tourism

The first type is known as “preserving nature.” This type of natural conservation involves the protection and preservation of natural resources. The second is “conserving resources,” which focuses on conserving materials and energy sources that are already present. The last type is "eco-tourism." Eco-tourism includes activities such as eco hikes, educational trips, and observing wildlife in their natural habitats.

Ways to Achieve Natural Conservation

Give up meat for a day

Swap your toothbrush for a bamboo one

Take shorter showers

Buy organic produce when possible

Bring your own reusable bag when you shop

Buy recycled goods whenever possible

Use energy-efficient appliances

Replace any electronics with high-efficiency models when they break down or die

Use LED lights instead of standard incandescents in your home office or bedroom

Do not use plastic products if you can avoid them

Conclusion

As a society, we are going through a lot of changes. New technology, new discoveries, and new inventions are constantly changing the way we live and work. But the biggest change in our lives is that we are leaving a lot of trash behind for our children and grandchildren to clean up.

The goal of this article is to give you ten good tips to help you save the planet with natural conservation. These tips will make your lifestyle more sustainable and will help us leave this planet in better shape for our future generations.

#sacred forests #natural conservation

Running and the Sacred Forests

Approximately one lifetime ago I wrote an MA thesis on kaya forests and discourses about traditional authority in Mijikenda communities since the mid-19th century. According to oral traditions, the kayas were the original homesteads of the Mijikenda ethnic groups that live in the hinterlands of the Kenya coast. While they were long ago abandoned as settlements (and many likely never were used as residences) they are still considered spaces of great ritual significance. In 2008, a number of the kaya forests were gazetted as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO. In 2009, I had the chance to travel around with folks from the National Museums of Kenya and put up signs at several kayas marking them as World Heritage Sites. One of those sites was Kaya Kambe, just a short 30min jog from where I have been living in Ribe for the last month. At Kambe the elders argued over the placement of the UNESCO sign and tried to use the sign to settle a land dispute—something people still talk about today. At Kaya Ribe things were far more low key. When we arrived, a young kid showed us to an overgrown dirt path where the museum’s Land Cruiser could carry us to the forest’s entrance. Without any fanfare, we put up the sign and were quickly on our way.

Fast forward five years and I have run past Kaya Ribe almost every day for the last month. In contrast to some other kaya forests that have active—even moderately political—elders’ councils, Ribe is seldom visited for ritual occasions or otherwise. For most in the community, the forest is an ordinary space crossed regularly on short treks down from the heavily settled ridgeline to reach the shamba farm plots that sit below on an agriculturally rich plain that stretches almost all the way to the Indian Ocean. One anthropologist has suggested that the sacredness of the kaya forests increased as they became more and more remote to everyday life (Parkin, 1991). In Ribe, the forest can hardly be considered remote. While most recognize the historical and cultural significance of the kaya, it seems to be far less of a sacred site than it is an ancient, but aesthetic forest patch woven into the rhythms of everyday activities as mundane as tending to a farm plot, sitting on one’s porch, and for some weird visitors, running.

View of Kaya Ribe from a nearby footpath