The Pastoralist Integrated Support Programme (PISP) is an intermediary, local Non-Governmental Organization based in the Marsabit District of northern Kenya. Initiated in 1996, PISP started working with pastoral communities and their traditional Ya’a councils (which govern the social/cultural aspects of the wider Gabbra community) to reduce nomadic household poverty by establishing sustainable water access within the District. In recent years, PISP has extended its work to the other ethnic groups within Marsabit, including the Rendille, Turkana, Borana and Samburu. Due to several years of successive droughts, these pastoral nomads have been faced with extreme water shortages, which have dissolved in light of critical domestic and livestock needs. Together, PISP and the local communities seek to strengthen resource management and the pastoral economic system by promoting community empowerment which is enhancing livelihoods and strengthening social well-being. To date, this unique partnership has led to an increase in community self-reliance, and a beginning to the end of a vicious cycle of poverty and despair that exists in the Arid and Semi-Arid Lands (ASAL) of northern Kenya.