What has been the most significant contribution of the National Steering Committee (NSC)?

"Acting as a group, NSC provided the programeme vision and goal, focusing on the area with the greatest potential for SGP to contribute to environmental conservation and sustainable development in China."

In your view, what is the most unique aspect of SGP?

"By providing its valuable spirit, vision, methods and models, SGP acts as a kindling, or a seed of fire, to drive the ispersion of the idea of sustainable development and conservation of the nature. The approach followed by SGP provides a leverage effect or an amplification effect for this program. The efficiency and absolutely positive response of this program is rare and very impressive."

Why and how is SGP important for your country?

"China has been facing complicated environmental problems and development challenges. SGP comes to China at a critical time to support hundreds of growing CSOs in addressing biodiversity, climate change, land degradation, chemical pollutions and transboundary water issues in a bottom up pattern. It reaches the most vulnerable people and those areas inaccessible for large conservation and development projects, to solve conflicts between development and conservation on the ground.

Beyond being a financial mechanism, SGP also serves as a nurturing center for the CSOs and local communities to develop their capacities for a sustainable livelihood and sound resource management. SGP also provides a platform for the CSOs, local communities and other stakeholders to share experiences and lessons learned, to build partnerships, to exchange information, to support each other and to feel being part of meaningful work.

With small grants, SGP has leveraged additional resources to achieve its goals and has generated profound and wide impact in China. The continuous upholding by CSOs and local communities, as well as the acknowledgement by government and other stakeholders SGP has received, will undoubtedly inspire this programme to improved performance in China."

What has been the most significant contribution of the National Steering Committee (NSC)?

"The significance of SGP in China is that it is probably the biggest - if not the only - NGO grant making mechanism officially recognized by the Government of China – yet, unlike other mechanisms, it is not run solely by a Ministry. [...] In this case the NSC is a unique example with a ministry being just one more voice in a steering committee with NGOs and CSOs present – it is an expression of confidence and openness on the part of the government, particularly the Ministry of Finance.

What is also significant is that the NSC members act responsibly – my sense is that they do recognize the importance of their work for China on two levels. The first of course would be the impact on the environment and the climate – and local actions can make a difference. The second would be on their contribution towards showing how NGOs could contribute towards sustainable development, with the support of government. In a real sense the SGP represents another milestone in the history of NGOs in China: the NGOs of China started predominantly in the environmental field – post Rio. To see an institutional mechanism that brings government and NGOs together is indeed progress."

How has the SGP benefitted your organization and/or community?

"It was a pleasure and a remarkable event that our project was selected and sponsored by SGP during 2010-2011. As one of the thousands of Grassroots NGOs in China, we see that SGP does not only provide financing for these projects, but more importantly, SGP provides us with a systematic 'learning by doing' opportunity to build our long-term capacity. Honestly, it took us a lot of time to develop the application, periodic project implementation reports, the accounting system and the documentary system. However, when we finalized the project and looked backwards, we have to admit that it is an irreplaceable experience. We prefer to refer to the SGP as a huge training course rather than a simple grant program. All of the knowledge and experience that we learn from SGP will definitely benefit us in the future".

How has the SGP benefitted your organization and/or community?

"The project management module of GEF SGP has provided a great opportunity of systematic training, practice and test for project planning, design, implementation and monitoring. This process is essential to our organization and to the participant staff, especially on thinking and working methods. Our organization has become more mature and gained long term benefits by implementing GEF SGP projects, e.g. we have had the sense to evaluate the performance of the work plan through budget and process monitoring.

Moreover, we realized that the participation of stakeholders, especially the participation of local beneficiary groups, is the key to smooth project implementation and long-term benefits. [...] As our partner, the forest police shifted its role from simple participation in our events to actively inviting us to be witnesses and supervise their enforcement actions. A joint patrol group named 'Bai Lin Niao' or 'Hundreds of Forest Birds' has been established by the forest police and the public. Moreover, based on the results of SGP project, the forest police have also increased their budget to set up billboards to raise the awareness of bird conservation.

The impact of our organization has seen an unprecedented increase through the implementation of GEF SGP projects. In 2011, we got funds from 'Lenovo Micro Public Welfare' to continuously protect birds on the basis of SGP project implementation. FFI and Stora Enso have also deepened the cooperation with us because of excellent performance in implementing GEF SGP."

In your view, what is the most unique aspect of SGP?

"The uniqueness of SGP is to support the standard and healthy development of civil society organizations in China. Through the implementation of SGP, the capacity of Chinese civil society organizations are improved; the communication, dialogue, interaction and cooperation between CSOs and other stakeholders are promoted."