Project Detail

Scale-up Sustainable Conservation of Biodiversity through alternative Livelihood Support

This is an upscale project that originated from the impact created on the project ?Sustainable Conservation of Biodiversity through alternative Livelihood Support (SCBLS)? funded by UNDP/ GEF Small Grants Programme and successfully implemented by GCDF-SL in 2017.
The main objective of this project is to conserve biodiversity by substituting livelihood activities that will accelerate local people?s support in Community-based conservation of threatened ecosystems and species. Tied with the strategic initiatives of GEF-Small Grants Programme OP7, the proposed project will promote agro ecology conservation and climate smart agriculture while mainstreaming Biodiversity Conservation in targeted villages and chiefdoms. The economic capacity of beneficiaries will be built with the provision of sustainable alternative livelihood to two hundred (200) forest intruders. Among the project activities, 200 forest intruders will be targeted and engaged in agriculture through IVS cultivation, food processing and marketing, improved Livestock production and management. The project will also conduct series of training to build the knowledge-base of community forest management/chiefdom development committees to be able to identify and prioritize conservation issues, analyze the risk and formulate appropriate management options to improve community-led biodiversity friendly practices and approaches, including the promotion of blue economy in 10 targeted forest edge communities of Barri and Makpella chiefdom. The primary outcome is to alleviate threats to biodiversity and improve the wellbeing of targeted groups with strong key indicators of achievement

Project Snapshot

Grantee:

Gondama Community Development Foundation Sierra Leone

Country:

Sierra Leone

Area Of Work:

Biodiversity

Operational Phase:

OP7 - Y1 (Jul 20-Jun 21)

Grant Amount:

US$ 25,000.00

Co-Financing Cash:

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 25,000.00

Project Number:

SLE/SGP/OP7/Y1/CORE/BD/17/12/2020/4

Start Date:

1/2021

End Date:

12/2021

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

Project Characteristics and Results

Capacity - Building Component

Based on our internal capacity assessment as an organization GCDF-SL enjoys the following strengths and opportunities: team work and inclusivity, a gender-sensitive functional board of directors, legally registered with the appropriate ministries, availability of able work force, successful implementation of past projects, own transport facilities and enjoy maximum cooperation from beneficiaries and communities among others. However, as weaknesses and threats, the organization is faced with the following: Inadequate resources to effectively implement activities in line with our core mandate,

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

In a sustainable manner, this project will create an enabling environment where target beneficiaries communities will be empowered to improve the management of targeted priority biodiversity to enhance its capacity for replication of best biodiversity conservation practices. Enhancing livelihoods and food security of local communities, the project will train and provide support to 200 project beneficiaries (women farmers and local hunters) to increase production and productivity in a market-oriented development approach that will induce increase household production and incomes, improve health and nutritional status, increase producers? bargaining power and community food security and resilience with a focus to strengthen human capabilities. The strategy is gender balanced using interactive participatory methods to enhance poverty reduction and incorporate improvement in the lives of local people as a condition to achieve sustainable biodiversity conservation

Gender Focus

The inclusiveness on of gender on this project however, will require both men and women including people with disabilities in the project area to see themselves as partners in protecting the Gola Rain Forest. Advancing gender in the environment will allow them to share knowledge together and work to improve conditions in the respective communities. The chronically vulnerable groups that include the disabled will be included as part of the beneficiaries and support them to explore livelihood opportunities to diversify household income and attain sustainable food security. The engagement of marginalized female youths in the project activities stems from the fact that if their livelihood status is not improved, they represent a threat to the stability of the conservation forest. Protection (including child protection) is part of an on-going effort in the communities by GCDF-SL to safeguard the rights of children, including protection from child labour and other forms of abuse and this intervention will dialogue with farmers to discontinue the use of child labour in agricultural activities.

Notable Community Participation

The project established a process of involving local communities in conservation efforts through dialogues and participatory planning techniques as well as identifying local concerns, needs, and priorities while the country?s ecosystems in a sustainable manner. During focus group discussions at the assessment stage, the first step was to identify objectives, including the priorities. Youths and other relevant stakeholders in beneficiary communities were allowed to play an active role in the planning and designing of this project. They assisted in identifying the overall conservation objectives and genuinely participated in the overall meetings. During the assessment stage, several questions were addressed such as: ? Who will be affected by conservation activities? ? What are their interests? ? Who has a right to participate? ? How do different stakeholders affect the conservation area

Policy Impact

The project will work with the field animators and the M&E team in other to generate documented evidence of the results and impact of the project. The Field animators and M&E Assistant will carry out, focused group discussions; sentinel household analysis, reflective practices and document lessons learned. This information will be incorporated into community bylaws which the community stakeholders will use as an effective policy document to support community-based conservation efforts in a more sustainable way. The document as a result will also be uses to support continued capacity building of target beneficiary communities. At the implementation end, the documented information and byelaws will be shared with UNDP/GEF Small Grants Programme (Donor) and all relevant stakeholders and partnership offices

Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment

The results of the project will be communicated to all stakeholders and funding agency on an agreed reporting time schedule. Community Radio program soap opera and newspaper publications will be used as key in disseminating information on project result and stories from the field. Project sign post with information on project core objectives and outcome, name of implementing agency and UNDP/GEF Small Grants Programme as funding agency will be displayed in the ten (10) target communities to popularized donor support in project implementation. Lessons learnt from the implantation will be sustained for possible replication in other communities or to be shared among interested partners including researchers.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

Traditional knowledge will be collectively taken form stories, songs proverbs, cultural values, beliefs, rituals, community laws, local languages and agricultural practices, including the development of plant species and animal breeds. Relying on traditional knowledge and sustainable resource management practices, indigenous cultures have survived and thrived in all corners. In the targeted project communities, the plight of biodiversity is closely intertwined with that of indigenous cultures. For example, a significant fraction of Gala forest protected areas, the principal tool for biodiversity conservation, is found within or overlaps with indigenous lands, territories and resources. Therefore this project is precisely around these strong connections between conservation and indigenous communities in recognition to the important role that they play in biodiversity conservation

Inovative Financial Mechanisms

project will assist a wide array of development partners, including the Ministry of Environmental, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Ministry of Lands and country planning and Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and food security to enhance the enabling conditions and policy frameworks supporting improved management of biodiversity resources, enhanced security of land and natural resource use rights, and effective civil society engagement. This will also assist in data collection and sharing as well as supporting the community of practice. The management Knowledge efforts of this project will target support for the other site-based conservation activity named ?Hopanda? which means in Mende language "take good care of".

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Indicators

Biophysical

Hectares of globally significant biodiversity area protected or sustainably managed by project 250

Empowerment

Number of CBOs / NGOs participated / involved in SGP project 3

Livehood

Number of individuals (gender diaggregated) who have benefited* from SGP project 200

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