The project will be carried out in Gia Luan and Viet Hai communes, located in the core and buffer zone of Cat Ba National Park, in Cat Hai District, Hai Phong Province. Cat Ba National Park was established in 1992 and is listed as the highest national conservation priority in the National Biodiversity Action Plan. It is located in the Cat Ba archipelago, which is part of Ha Long Bay, declared World Heritage Site in 1994, and includes Cat Ba Island, several small islands nearby, and the surrounding surface waters. The Park contains highly valuable biological resources of the limestone ecosystems. A World Bank Workshop on limestone conservation in South East Asia, organised in Vietnam in 1999, has stressed the global importance of protecting limestone ecosystems and its associated endemic plant and animal species in Vietnam. The Cat Ba archipelago together with Ha Long Bay features Vietnam's most magnificent limestone landscape of fencong and fenglin karst that has been invaded by the sea. It is considered as one of the world's most important sites for science regarding limestone karst geomorphology. The Cat Ba archipelago consists of some 300 islands of mainly rugged, karst limestone, the preferred habitat of the Golden-headed langur (Semnopithecus franoisi poliocephalus), which is a global conservation priority and listed on Conservation International's recent 'The world's top 25 most endangered primates'. This primate is the highest priority of Vietnam's National Primate Action Plan. The only primate population of this species in the world is found in Cat Ba National Park. The Park is also one of the only two protected areas in Vietnam that includes a marine environment. It is considered as the most important among the proposed marine protected areas of northern Vietnam. Fringing reefs and associated sea grass and mangroves dominate the marine part of the Park.
However, the Park is facing the ecosystem degradation and biodiversity loss due to the overexploitation of the Park resources of the community, especially the animals, including the Golden-headed langur. Only 20 individuals are known to exist in the Cat Ba National Park. Population growth and low living standard of the community living in the core and buffer zone of the Park put considerable pressure on the Park management and protection. The current threats to the biodiversity of the Cat Ba National Park are hunting, firewood collection, illegal timber cutting, grazing, fire, agricultural encroachment and uncontrolled tourism. Dynamite fishing and tourism demand for coral reefs have severely degraded the coral reefs. The exploitation of marine resources using destructive methods is very common.
Protection of the terrestrial and marine biodiversity within the Park is ineffective due to inadequate human resources of the Park and overlapping responsibilities with the relevant government organisations, and more importantly, limited participation and support of the local authorities and community due to their low understanding and awareness on biodiversity conservation and community strong dependence on the Park resources for their daily livelihoods.
Raising environmental awareness of local stakeholders and community, generating their support for the conservation of Cat Ba National Park, and developing models which suit local conditions to diversify community income sources, is the main purpose of the project to contribute to achieving the overall goal of maintaining the biodiversity of terrestrial and marine ecosystems in the Cat Ba National Park. This will be achieved through conservation awareness activities, participatory development and application of local regulations for biodiversity conservation, and the development of agricultural production models aiming to increase community income, reducing their strong dependence on the Park resources for their daily subsistence and livelihoods. The project will also contribute to conserving the variety of local mandarin of high economic value, which is facing the deterioration and under the threat of genetic loss.
The project expects to contribute to the implementation of the potential macro GEF project on biodiversity conservation of Cat Ba National Park, which has been initiated and developed by UNDP-GEF Vietnam, through creating favourable conditions for the macro GEF implementation by raising awareness and appreciation on the Park of the local authorities and community, and enhancing the co-operation in the Park management and protection between the Park management board and the local authorities, army forces and the community. In addition, it will provide the lessons learned on the ways to diversify income sources for the community living in the core and buffer zone, reducing their overexploitation of the Park natural resources. The project will also join the effort of the international communities, including UNDP Vietnam as well as the Government in contributing to alleviating poverty of the island community in the project area while conserving the biodiversity.