Primary Objective of the project is to establish community-based system for monitoring, prevention and fighting forest fires in the Soon Sakesar forest area by organizing formal groups of volunteer fire-fighters in 12 villages situated in Sakesar forest range (Referred to in this document as ?Community Fire Brigade?)

Context of the Activity
The proposed activity falls under biodiversity conservation category of GEF mandate. It is also very relevant to the new GEF Pakistan strategic framework of eco-regional approach. Soon Valley is heart of the Salt Range ecosystem. The proposed project villages are very important ecological part of Soon Valley. Also the forests of these villages are inhabited by vital wildlife like Punjab Urial and black partridges. This forest range is watershed area for Ochhali and Khabeki wetlands, which is a Ramsar site. GEF-SGP is already supporting three conservation initiatives in the valley. These are: conservation of underground water through watershed management, community-based protection of Sakesar range forest and Khura forest development and training centre.

Description of the Proposed Activity
1.Current Situation:
There are about 8 to 15 incidents of forest fires in a year in different parts of Soon Valley in which hundreds of acres of forest is burnt mostly because of absence any fire prevention system inefficient fire fighting approach by forest department and concerned communities.

There are two type of forest fire i.e. natural forest fire and unnatural or human-made forest fire that occur on a regular basis in the Soon Sakesar Forest range. Natural fire often occurs with happening of thunderstorm and lowering of humidity level. Unnatural fire often occurs due to human omission and commission. Sometimes community members harvesting forest produce or just passing through carelessly throw away burning cigarettes or match stick or just burn a little fire to make tea and their negligence causes fire. Sometimes professional woodcutter mafia sets forest on fire during summer to benefit from burnt trees in winter. Even forest guards some times do it to hide their connivance with woodcutter mafia and consequent damage to government forest. It has been observed and a forum of Soon Valley communities held in May 2000 jointly agreed that people who want illegal benefit from forest deliberately ignite most of the forest fires. (Copy of the proceeding of forum report has already been circulated to the GEF NSC in its meeting of 7 August 2000). Also due to excessive grazing and deforestation activities have lessened the forest biomass in the valley and consequently chances of natural fires have also decreased.

2. The Problem
Routine efforts by forest department to fight forest fires, natural and unnatural, are not delivering because of lack of staff in the forest department and motivation among communities. There is a need to integrate efforts of stakeholder communities with government action to get better results. Under the current situation, when a forest fire occurs, typically a few officials of the forest department will mobilize some men from nearby villages to beat out the fire. This is usually done without training and in a haphazard manner that can often cause harm to the forest where there are young tree saplings in the forest. In cases where there is fire in the protected area at PAF base, a front line approach of quickly approaching the problem is weak. In the past few years, two incidences were observed when a fire in PAF base area took on a large scale and the para- military forces were called in to fight fire that may have caused damage to PAF equipment and infrastructure. However, this approach is expensive, and does not take into account the protection of the health of the forest and can in itself cause damage to the forest that takes decades of regeneration to rectify.

Much of this harm can be avoided and a far more efficient approach can be obtained if the communities are organized, trained and equipped to fight forest fires. This can be further improved if community action is coordinated with the forest department in the first instance. When relevant the PAF protected area of Sakesar can also coordinate with community action. This is particularly important when there is fire in areas of forest that lie adjacent to Sakesar especially in Ucchali, Chitta and Ugali.

Fire Prevention

There are a fewer incidences of natural fire in forests in the Salt Range area because the biomass has already degraded to a great extent. The unnatural fire incidents are quite frequent. Sometimes the forest products harvester or passers-by carelessly throw away burning cigarettes and match sticks and cause fire or make tea and do not extinguish fire. But as the common perception holds in the valley, most of the forest fires are unnatural and caused by commission. The woodcutting Mafia and the forest department officials cause such fires to hide their worst practices in the forest.

What Happens when there is a forest fire?
Recurrence of forest fire in Soon Valley forests is a common thing. About 8 to 15 fire incidents occur in Sakesar range forest in a year. Most of the time communities living in forest premises inform forest guards about fires as forest guards are rarely found in forest premises. Then the forest guards go to fire spots with community members, ill-equipped and start extinguishing fire. Forest Department or communities do not have necessary equipment to fight fire. They just break branches of trees and bushes to beat fire flames and rather cause some damage to trees and bushes particularly young saplings. In the case of fire in Shamlat the fighting story is no different. Since most of the shamlat is common property of villages, very few people attend to fire incidents. No efficient system to fight fire is existing and even a lot of damage is already done before any extinction action is taken. The community action is always reluctant and not motivated unless damage to some community member?s personal property is feared. Neither there is any proper arrangement for fire fighting like water at the hot spot nor the communities are trained to extinguish fire. (There is a lack of correct techniques such as recognizing the wind directions to predict the direction of the fire, using existing paths as fire breaks, fighting fire by making controlled fires, using water in controlled quantities, and raking out smouldering bits of matter to prevent another break out)

Two years back a major fire incident engulfed Sakesar PAF base and even reached its heli-pad area. A major paramilitary action was undertaken with a lot of reinforcement from Sargodha PAF base was hastened to extinguish fire which took two days. However, this large effort was aimed at stopping the fire without a view to mitigating harm to the precious biological resources that are contained within Sakesar itself.

2.Project Description
In accordance with the proposed project, a community fire brigade of 12 villages of Soon Valley will be formed. These 12 villages share stakes in project area that extends from Sakesar to Jhungewala and also include Khura, a site of another GEF-SGP supported initiative. All these twelve villages are situated in the Sakesar Forest Range where this project will be implemented. Sakesar Range is one of the most important range in Soon Sakesar as a portion of it has been accorded special protection by Sakesar Air Force base. And the range is a catchment area for three lakes i.e. Ochhali, Namal, Khabeki, of Ochhali wetland complex. The Sakesar forest range is a significant local hot spot for flora and fauna. The Soon Sakesar forum identified this activity in May 2000 when community leaders of the area met to discuss priorities for conservation in the area. The project therefore arises from this community-based priority setting and is therefore highly acceptable in the valley.

A motivated village forest protection activist of every village will be leader of village fire brigade. The village leader will, in turn facilitate formation of village brigade comprising of 30 motivated volunteers . An MoU will be signed between the community and the forest department to help each other in protecting forests especially in case of forest fire. The village CBO, forest department, project coordinator and the project social organizer will help to identify and form this group and this group will be registered with forest department at district level for its voluntary services to the forest department in fire fighting. Soon Valley Development Program and WWF-P project office will informally support this activity. The District Action Committee will approve formation of villages fire brigade and award it a formal status. The individuals volunteering as fire brigade members will be motivated to fight forest fire. After identification and motivation, the villages leaders and volunteer fire brigade members will be imparted necessary training through WWF-P, Civil Defense, Forest Department and SVDP. A group of two expert trainers will train/orient these trainers and they will in turn impart training to community fire brigade members to capacitate them to undertake their fire fighting activities. After training, the village fire brigades will be provided necessary and simple equipment like fire beaters, rakes, rudimentary fire pumps and water drums for fighting forest fire.

After necessary motivation and training to volunteer community fire brigade members, they will go back to their usual occupational activities but simultaneously remain alert in case of forest fire occurrence. Usually fire occurs in Soon Valley between late April to mid July and start September to end November.

In accordance with proposed project?s activities, 20 to 30 trained volunteer forest fire fighters, equipped with necessary material will fight fire in an organized way so that the action is taken efficiently and coherently. Forest Department guards will be part of the team and the fire fighting will be done in close collaboration with Forest Department. Presumably 20 fire fighters are available to fight a fire incidence.

They will be divided into two groups of fire beaters. Each group having 8 fire beaters. Two will spray water with the help of fire pumps and two will use rakes to spread the burnt biomass to extinguish it completely. The fire fighters will use their knowledge acquired during training like assessing the direction of wind to read fire etc. In case of fire spreading and getting out of control of one village fire brigade, help of other villages fire brigades will be sought. The forest department and the DAC will be duly informed about the incidence well in time. The forest fire fighters will be provided a meal through project funds by way of physical sustenance during this demanding work. (Please refer to the attached annex that is used to support this model of work already defined in the Hazarganji ?Chiltan National Park Management Plan)

A credit program for forest dwellers and village communities will be initiated. The wood collectors which cut forest for firewood selling will be invited to shift to sustainable livelihoods instead of damaging the forests and will be provided loans to help them adopt businesses that are environment friendly. These pilferers use camels for transporting wood to the markets. They will be persuaded to sell their camels to shift to sustainable livelihoods and will be facilitated through credit in switching to greener professions like composting, bee-keeping, and promotion of LPG or Biogas, nursery raising, cattle farming etc. Those loanees who may like to start cattle farming will be encouraged to rear dhanni cow, a local variety of cattle which is becoming rare because of cross breeding with other varieties. Initial dialogues and motivation process is already underway. Loans will be provided to those who will sign an agreement before getting loan that they will protect forest against deforestation and fire incidences. The credit program will provide necessary funds for NGO to continue these activities beyond the project duration.

A water pond-digging program is also envisaged as a start up incentive to the communities of project area. Under this programme either the existing ponds will be renovated or new ponds will be constructed where previous ponds are beyond renovation. These ponds would provide water for fire fighting, rehabilitation of the depleting aquifer and to fulfill needs of forest dwellers for household and livestock use. A sum of Rs 40,000 has been specified for renovation of old ponds or construction of a new water pond in every village, which will be used to hire the digging equipment. The communities will construct the retaining wall around these ponds the value of which (though in kind) is more than the sum specified for digging. An agreement will be signed with beneficiary communities that they will jointly help in putting off fires in case of fire incident and will facilitate forest protection activities.

The credit program and digging of water ponds will win a lot of protection support not only for the current project but also for other GEF projects and the conservation activities being initiated by WWF-P and the area CBOs.

Activities to be carried out under the project:
i) Motivated forest protection volunteers to be identified from 12 villages. The gravity of forest fire problem to be shared with them.
ii) A fire brigade of 30 volunteers from a village to be formed and two out of them identified to take leading role.
iii) Trainers to be trained through master trainers for onward training.
iv) The 30 volunteers from every village provided necessary training and knowledge by trainers about forest fire, its prevention and how to fight it.
v Credit program for project villages communities, and particularly forest dwellers involved in deforestation and forest fire to be started to win their support.
vi Agreements signed with communities of different villages to prevent and fight fire and check deforestation.
vii The village fire brigades provided necessary equipment like fire beaters, fire pumps, rakes and water drums to fight forest fire efficiently.
viii Water ponds dug in every village forest with community participation as an incentive to communities
ix Refresher course to take place once in the project to address practical problems and techniques.
x A project evaluation is planned to assess and disseminate the results of the project

Location
The project is located in Valley Soon Sakesar, Salt Range ecosystem. Twelve villages i.e. Ochhali, Chitta, Ogali, Kotli, Anga, Mardwal, Dhadhar, Khabeki, Jhungewala, Ahmadabad, Jaba and Khura of Sakesar forest range will be the main target area. (3 ?D GIS Map of Soon Sakesar already circulated to the GEF NSC in meeting of 7 August 2000. The reader is kindly asked to refer to this)

Links with existing and planned projects in Soon Sakesar
· SVDP: This project has been in place for the past 5 years and is an affiliate of OPP and is a recipient of a GEF/SGP grant. The office of SVDP will provide office space for the project coordinator and will closely support, monitor and report on the activities of the Community Fire Brigade. SVDP plays a focal role in mobilizing the local CBOs of Soon Sakesar and is a trusted coordinator.
· WWF: Already has a close working with the CBO and shares an office with SVDP. Is stepping up conservation work in the Soon Valley as it is interested in the wetland complex (may form part of the GEF Wetlands project). WWF will play a key role in providing training of trainers in community fire fighting.
· Khura Forest Training Institute: This recently approved GEF/SGP project will start implementation within 2000. It will participate in this project in order to further protect its forest, as well as provide a good training and refresher venue when it is ready with its training facilities.
· Community Forest Protection Council: This recently approved GEF/SGP project will also commence activities in 2000 in the same forest area that is included in this project. This project will include the training of community forest guards as part of the community forest brigade and will expand the number of persons from the 10 guards from each village to a total of 30 trained forest fire fighting volunteers in each village.
In summary, this project is part of the close integration and convergence that is planned for all conservation and development activities taking place in Soon Sakesar Valley. Due to its relatively good community relations, the villages in the valley are already frequently discussing the problems and activities needed to conserve the natural resources of the valley. The district Action Committee of the local administration is also well aware and monitoring and facilitating all these activities. In terms of social mobilization of an Eco region this is a valuable opportunity to coordinate all-important activities in the valley.

Background
One natural resource conservation issue of the area is depleting underground water table. Soon Valley Development Program, an affiliate of Orangi Pilot Project, started working on creating awareness about depleting underground water table in 1997 and GEF-SGP project on conservation of underground water through watershed management was awarded to the NGO in Nov: 1997. WWF-P project office is also engaged in wetland conservation activities in the Valley. For last years, SVDP and WWF-P are working in close collaboration to organize communities for protecting natural resources. WWF-P and government will also initiate a major wetland conservation project in Ochhali complex from June 2001.

In February 2000 a symposium was organized by SVDP, WWF-P and other CBOs and it was decided by consensus to form a forum for conservation of biodiversity. As such Soon Valley Biodiversity Conservation Forum came into being to integrate natural resource protection activities. SVDP and WWF-P are organizing CBOs in all villages of Soon Valley in coordination with Social Welfare Department.

The Deputy Commissioner in district Khushab is supporting development and conservation initiatives of NGOs and CBOs. On the lobbying of SVDP & WWF-P, a District Action Committee for Natural Resource Protection and Sustainable Development has been formed. (Annexure-2) SVDP, WWF-P, NRSP, Col. Sher Welfare Society and other community activists and district line departments are its members.

The village communities are now organizing through CBOs, formal groups and through the interventions and activities of SVDP, WWF-P and other CBOs. Due to campaigning by NGOs, section 144 against deforestation of Kahu and Phulai has already been imposed. Although imposition of section 144 is an administrative and legal tool, it has helped in checking deforestation.

Recently two CBOs have been awarded projects by GEF-SGP for community-based protection of Sakesar forest range and for Khura Forest development and training centre.

Timing

The proposed project will cover a period of 3 years i.e. from the date of start.

How the proposed activity will be carried out

Role of the recipient
Ogali Welfare and Development Society in collaboration with forest department, SVDP and WWF-P will carry out the community-based fire-fighting project. SVDP will provide all sort of institutional support to OWDC from proposal writing to communicating lessons learnt. The general secretary of the CBO will work as coordinator of the project and he will be based in SVDP office and coordinate project activities in close collaboration with SVDP. The project social organizer will assist all the 12 villages that participate in this project to identify, motivate, train and monitor volunteers in the villages for the project. The OWDC will launch a credit program for fire brigade members. It will spend on maintenance of equipment from income of the credit program. The program enhance institutional capacity of the NGO and make it sustainable.

Role of Communities
The communities in Valley Soon Sakesar are already quite well organized and sensitized to the depleting natural resource base. More then a dozen of CBOs in engaged in sustainable development activities. The communities will be further mobilized and trained and community members will work as volunteer members of community fire brigades. The volunteer forest guards will by themselves be part of fire brigades. Through this participatory process village communities will feel themselves stakeholders and beneficiaries. The communities will benefit from credit program and water ponds and ensure, in turn, forest protection. They will identify water ponds sites.

Role of partner organizations
The partner organizations i.e. the NGOs and CBOs active in Valley Soon Sakesar will assist in identifying motivated community members and mobilizing them. The District Action Committee will play a vital role in creating linkages and networking with line departments. The role of DAC will be advisory, monitoring and supportive. WWF-P, SVDP, Khura Forest Development and Training Centre will be providing necessary training and networking facilities to the project activists.

Anticipated results of project:
The initiation of community-based fire-fighting brigade activity will create a sense of ownership in village groups. The activities will support government action to fight forest fire. The activity will help protect forest biomass and save wildlife.

· A system of community-based trained and equipped fire fighting groups in place. Training will include relevant officials from Forest Department and PAF base so that good coordination and understanding is facilitated.
· Over 350 volunteers motivated, trained and equipped to fight forest fire
· Quick and efficient fire fight action decreases forest biomass loss.
· Environment friendly green businesses promoted among the project aprticipants through credit.
· A water pond in every village dug for availability of water to fight forest fire, stabilize aquifer and provide water for domestic use to forest dwellers.
· Agreements signed with villages communities to continue forest protection activities after completion of the project.
· Institutional capacity of the executing NGO enhanced and element of sustainability attained through a permanent credit program.
· Biomass protection upgrades watershed area, wetlands and underground water table.
· Gene pool of local Dhanni cow preserved which can be later replicated.