Northern Rangelands Trust is the umbrella organisation for 43 community conservancies in northern and coastal Kenya. It was established as a shared resource to help build and develop community conservancies, which are best positioned to enhance people’s lives, build peace, and conserve the natural environment. Member conservancies are local institutions run for and by indigenous people to support the management of community-owned land for the benefit of improving livelihoods. Legally registered entities, conservancies work to improve governance and representation for their members by building on traditional, indigenous cultural structures, and empowering women and youth in particular to become agents of change. 

Likewise, the Northern Rangelands Trust Trading Livestock-to-Markets business aims to improve the income pastoralists, and their conservancies, receive from their cattle. Livestock-to-Markets buys cattle directly from conservancies, using a transparent weight-based pricing system, paying pastoralists directly. At the markets, pastoralists contribute a small percentage of their sale revenue to the conservancy kitty, as a contribution to community and conservation projects.

This is matched by a contribution from Northern Rangelands Trust Trading, a business accelerator for social and conservation impact enterprises. This accelerator was established for the development of sustainable and resilient commerce across the member conservancies, at all levels of the social spectrum: from household businesses run by women and youth to conservancy-based businesses that leverage community assets, to businesses operated by NRT Trading to improve value chain dynamics and connect people to distant markets.