Project Detail

Land Reclamation of abandon artisanal mined out sites in Nongowa and Lower Bambara Chiefdoms, Kenema District, Sierra Leone

A high proportion of Sierra Leoneans living in rural parts of Kenema District which is in the Eastern Region of Sierra Leone engage in small scale or artisanal mining. This sector is characterized by low level capital investments, high labor inputs and a low level of minerals output, with shallow workings, mainly concentrated in the superficial geological deposits, including alluvial sands and gravels in main river basins. Artisanal mining is usually practiced at community level, with a single unit-owned licensed enterprise or non-licensed operators or individuals hired by a working artisanal miner or land owner and family (i.e. a household). Because simple extraction and processing techniques are used with limited mechanization, the sector suffers significant constraints including low or non-profit margins and frequent losses, environmental degradation and very poor social economic conditions. Many of these challenges can be overcome with greater knowledge, improved equipment and regulation of business practices.
The proposed project will improve biodiversity conservation, food production and improvement of water and pastures to boost agriculture production and environmental conservation in the targeted communities and their environs.
The main objective of the proposed project is to promote environmental management in the artisanal sector and to forester sustainable livelihood and well-being of artisanal mining communities in Kenema District.
Specifically, the following objectives are set to achieved at the end of the project:
?To increase food and economic security through the conversion of degraded lands to agricultural land that can accommodate mixed farming, agro forestry and fish farming for improved living standards of more than 5 vulnerable communities in Nongowa chiefdoms in Kenema District.
?To protect, rehabilitate and conserve wetlands in targeted communities thereby covering over 50 hectares of degraded lands as a result of unregulated artisanal mining.
?To strengthen the human capacity of at least 5 target communities by increasing their knowhow on effect of artisanal or small scale mining and environmental management through the implementation of climate smart agro ecological strategies that include rangelands management, organic farming, polycultures, seed banks for indigenous crops and reduced tillage to increase crop yields.
?To address land degradation through gully reclamation, afforestation, reforestation and woodlots development within the targeted communities.
To promote environmental policy dialogues and information dissemination through facilitating climate change Participatory workshops and the establishment of Natural Resources Management Leadership Forums that will facilitate collection and sharing of information within the landscape.

Project Snapshot

Grantee:

Youth Emergency Auxiliary Service Sierra Leone

Country:

Sierra Leone

Area Of Work:

Land Degradation

Operational Phase:

OP7 Y3 (July 22-June 23)

Grant Amount:

US$ 20,000.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 4,548.00

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 15,515.00

Project Number:

SLE/SGP/OP7/Y3/STAR/LD/1/11/2022/32

Start Date:

12/2022

End Date:

12/2023

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

Project Characteristics and Results

Inovative Financial Mechanisms

Learning and knowledge management are key parts of the project. This will involve establishing systems of learning linked to all components that build on the multi-stakeholder platforms, partnerships with the Environment Protection Agency and working directly with communities and households on the ground using ?action research? approaches (learning by doing). A strong emphasis will be placed on interdisciplinary approaches between biophysical and social science, with a particular focus on rural development as a nexus between understandings of social and environmental systems, including critical power, decision making and equality issues (including gender, income and group identification). Focus will be on learning from experience and sharing this experience across the district and the regions, more generally through knowledge and exchange at national levels (conferences, symposia, national policy platforms), including through experience sharing. The project will prepare at least two knowledge briefs per year and will work with a set of ?Champions? (community, experts, other non-governmental and private sector) in each project site to capture their experiences and knowledge on an ongoing basis over the 1-year period. The project will also collect gender-disaggregated data at all levels and will continually strive to improve the depth, range and quality of this data over the lifetime of the project

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

Plots will be engaged on agricultural activities for women. The training on the steps of liquid fertilizer preparation and application will also be conducted for the women who are vegetable growers during the off-season periods of the year. The liquid manure will be useful to the women as a readily available source of fertilizers within the communities

Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment

Results from the project will be disseminated within and beyond the project intervention area through existing information sharing networks and forums. The project will identify and participate, as relevant and appropriate, in scientific, policy-based and/or any other networks, which may be of benefit to the project. The project will identify, analyse and share lessons learned that might be beneficial to the design and implementation of similar projects and disseminate these lessons widely. There will be continuous information exchange between this project and other projects of similar focus in the same area, region and nationally. Pictures and success stories will be posted on different media outlets and updates shared on social media platforms.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

The inclusion of indigenous people provides sustainability and empowerment to vulnerable groups. The project will adopt the local language for trainings and follow ups of skills acquired by indigenous people. The Youths and other relevant stakeholders in beneficiary communities played an active role in the planning and designing of this project. They assisted in identifying some of the project objectives and genuinely participated in setting up potential activities of the proposed project. Experience learnt from previous interventions proves that promoting Climate Smart Innovative Agro-ecology for biodiversity conservation can only be achieved through local support and participation.

Notable Community Participation

The local community will contribute with local resources for the implementation of the project. This improves community project ownership and sustainability. Their co-financing in terms of cash and kind will increase the project outreach and value for money. The local leadership will participate with guidance and indigenous knowledge systems which are key to the implementation of the proposed project thereby leading to the reduction of climate change related risks in the 5 targeted communities. The communities are already participating in small scale wetlands conservation activities.

Capacity - Building Component

The organization has staff and volunteers that focus on protecting the environment at community level. They have the experience and skill to implement the project

Policy Impact

The project will focus on establishing a logic of integrated landscape management policy and practice that enables decision makers and communities to value landscape restoration within wider value chain development processes. At the end of the project, district learning events will be convened with other like-minded projects to assess progress at a macro-level across the District in environmental sustainability and food security interventions. This will be linked to the production of two key policy reports with associated briefing papers highlighting key lessons learnt and policy pointers for future government action under the intervention

Gender Focus

The umbrella organization and its subsidiary body they are about 50% women and 50% that fully manages the affairs of the organization including its affiliated entities. These youth and women groups have been working together for the past year implementing support received from different organization, donor and government. They have built a very much cohesive force that strongly plays the role of advocacy and women empowerment over the years. Women will be the primary target beneficiaries of this proposed project though disability is a priority in the selection process. The developed swamps will be allocated and the beneficiaries will engage in multiple cropping activities. The community youths will be contracted to develop the swamps into plots. Both young boys and girls who are able-bodied to provide the labor required to develop the swamps will be involved. A community engagement on land access and ownership will be carried out for land owners to make available acres of swamps to women beneficiaries.

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Indicators

Biophysical

Hectares of degraded land rest 50

Livehood

Number of individuals (gender diaggregated) who have benefited* from SGP project 100

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