Capacity - Building Component
Environmental challenges identified during baseline assessment include general degradation od rangeland and wetlands resources, uncontrolled veld fires and poor governance. Rangelands and wetlands rehabilitation and management refresher training and fire management were identified as critical for sustainable land and water resources management. Leadership and conflict resolution and record keeping were also identified critical for coherence and growth of the organization. Training on sustainable livelihood, amidst high unemployment was revealed as a real need.
Policy Influence
High in the priorities of the Range Resources Management is strengthened engagement of local communities in the governance sustainable management of rangelands through establishment of range resource management organizations and their empowerment. The project has contributed towards achievement of this government goal.
Project sustainability
Linkages with relevant government institutions have been maintained throughout project implementation, with some of the trainings conducted by the same institutions. These include Departments of Range Resources management, Environment, Forestry and Cooperatives and Marketing. The CBO continues to enjoy mentorship and technical backstopping form these departments. The income generating activities that are off to a fairly good start are motivation for continued work in rangeland rehabilitation.
Linkages gef projects
N/A
Planning gef grant
N/A
Notable Community Participation
The Association has a membership of 40 people, with gender composition is 14 females and 26 males. Ten (10) of its members are youth which is a critical ingredient in the sustainability and coherence of the Association. This is a youth-led organization as youth hold the chairmanship position.
Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment
The District Coordination Office will share information and knowledge from this project to promote good practice and scale up of innovations. Also, lessons learnt from this project will be publicized through the press. Field days will also be arranged, and site visits encouraged among Associations doing similar work for cross learning. Overall, the District Coordination Office will share project information with GEF to feed into the country program.
Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods
The project area is abounded with Rosa rubiginosa, thus rosehip products will be one of the livelihood activities to be ventured into. Beekeeping and propagation of tree seedlings (forest and fruit) were also identified as potential income generating activities.
Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples
The project concept note was developed by the grantee and submitted in the local language Sesotho, one of the two official languages of Lesotho. For all consultations during baseline assessments and consensus building workshops, medium of instruction/communication was Sesotho.
Policy Impact
The project directly addresses the ?Community-based conservation of threatened ecosystems and species? focal area of the Lesotho SGP Country Strategy, and the National Strategic Development Plan 2018/19 ? 2022/23, Outcome 1.1 (Strategic Objectives 7 and 9 ? Build Capacity of Farmers, Agricultural Institutions and Associations; and Improve Management of Range Resources respectively). The project will address land degradation in two areas: rangeland rehabilitation and management; and wetland conservation and management, while also improving livelihoods through income generation activities such as beekeeping and vegetable production.
Gender Focus
The project has taken into considerations gender mainstreaming in its design in line with GEF SGP OP7 project indicators in Annex1. Gender membership is 25% women and 65% female which is a good composition given the nature of the projects on a sector that is predominantly male. Female representation in the committee is 40% which implies that women in the community are entrusted into positions of decision making.
During the consensus workshop gender issues were discussed in detail, and roles project planning, implementation and monitoring were agreed. During implementation of project activities, both women and men will participate equally to ensure complementarity of roles and equal access to natural resource in Mosaqane. Training planned during project implementation will be designed to further strengthen gender roles to empower women to participate and contribute to community development activities in Mosaqane.
Inovative Financial Mechanisms
Through monthly monitoring and reporting, project activities and lessons learnt will be documented and be available for sharing. Documentation will be done by both beneficiary Association members and District Coordination Office. During the implementation phase, different follow-up and monitoring activities will be undertaken to monitor project activities so as to establish how Association members are adopting new skills and knowledge acquired following trainings. The District Coordination Office will share information and knowledge from this project to promote good practice and scale up of innovations. Also, lessons learnt from this project will be publicized through the press. Field days will also be arranged, and site visits encouraged among Associations doing similar work for cross learning. Overall, the District Coordination Office will share project information with GEF to feed into the country program.
Project Results
*According to the strict definition of Indigenous peoples, there are no indigenous people in Lesotho. However, closest to the definition are herd-boys and or herders as increasingly adult men are also involved in the field of herding livestock. Herd-boys/herders spent the longest time in cattle posts deep into the mountains of Lesotho, in search of greener pastures for livestock. This places this group at the helm of rangelands and wetland resources management making them the strongest link. Wetlands destruction and veld fires were identified as major challenges in sustainable management of rangelands and wetlands of Mosaqane and Ha Ramoroke.
*In collaboration with the Department of Range Resources, a series of training workshops were held for herders and livestock owners, on the critical importance of sustainable management of rangelands for restoration of wetlands. Through this intervention, 3 livestock drinking points were constructed at strategic points and this has reduced trampling in wetlands with the result that the recovery process of these resources is progressing well.
*Fire management training for the herd-boys has also had a positive impact as no fires were reported in the last dry season. A total of 91 herd-boys and 78 herders (41 women and 37 men) benefitted from the training.
*This youth-led CBO has also introduced beekeeping to the community, a welcome initiative according to an old man who testified that because of the placement of a beehive next to his field his harvest of garden pees has more than doubled.
*Through the intervention 10 ha of rangelands and 3 wetlands are under sustainable management practices.
*To take advantage of the abundant rosehip in the area and putting acquired skills to test, the youth are producing rosehip-based products such as glycerin and Vaseline. Sales are picking steadily.
