Indigenous tribal community are the beneficiaries of integrated conservation and sustainable development project
The tribal communities in the 20 villages shifted from the sanctuary area were to be benefited by a rehabilitation package financed by the Ministry of Environment and Forests.
Notable Community Participation
Kinship-based flexible, small SHGs set up in 3 villages, for taking forward the proposed initiatives in a participatory manner. To sustain the interest of the community the self-help system has created a new sense and joy of local community ownerships. The system of fortnightly meetings introduced, where each household contributes a fixed amount as savings. This helped to familiarize the community with accounting and bookkeeping practices, and helped bring forward community members who could take on tasks like banking operations, book writing and account keeping. The institution?s sustainability was boosted significantly because of this move.
In one of the villages, the community began lending out of the common pool of funds, generated through savings and this has further enhanced their skills at collective credit management. This concludes that the community activities were more successful in handling external funds, creating a revolving fund, and ensuring timely loan repayment by individual households, ensuring financial sustainability to the lending effort. All this is increasing their livelihoods choices and minimizing their risks to starvation in the remote degraded areas.
Capacity - Building Component
Several exposure visits were taken outside the area and this was supplemented with on-site training and capacity building inputs from reputed organizations and individuals. A medicinal plants nursery was developed on a reserve plot in collaboration with a local farmer, and soil and water conservation works relevant to the project were demonstrated. The NGO has facilitated and created links to the state watershed dept and also the forest offices during the project implementation stage and the state is considering for the extension of funds to the NGO in the areas of watershed management.
Training of SWC team, women for managing the self help groups (SHGs) for maintaining records have generated confidence within the community. For instance, Village Development Committee (VDC) was trained to maintain proper records in the form of a village minutes book, a cash book and an attendance record register etc. The VDC held meetings every fortnight to discuss issues relating to implementation of the livelihood plan. All modifications, rates for various wage works, allocation of available funds discussed thoroughly and recorded in the minute?s register. This has been institutionalized within the project and the SHGs continue to meet and save.
Gender Focus
The community capacity enhancement, in terms of awareness, knowledge and skills due to various exposure visits and trainings by experts both for men and women.
Planning non gef grant
The partner has made close contacts with other donors as watershed deptt of the madhya pradesh state of india. The project is also being scaled through Government of india (GOI) grants
Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment
The project did not have any direct component of capacity building but the community became aware of water conservation and land management issues during the village meetings and participatory exercises that were done in the villages.
Policy Impact
The project worked in close coordination with the district administration, the local government authorities, the Panchayats, the forest department and other multilateral bodies to build close networks.
Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods
The tribal communities in the 20 villages shifted from the sanctuary area were to be benefited by a rehabilitation package financed by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India. However, the rehabilitation package was inadequate to fully meet needs of rehabilitation and address in particular the land degradation issues. Consequently, pressure on the sanctuary continued to persist. The NGO Samrakshan had been working for three years to address these gaps in the areas. In link to the discussions with the officials the NGO took forward a pilot program in the 3 out of the 20 villages. Through the use of more bottoms up, community led initiatives and using participatory rural appraisals (PRAs) model revealed that the following problems were more in order of priority of locals in the relocated villages:
? Poor quality of degraded agricultural land and take water conservation measures to ensure better agriculture production and livestock.
? Inadequacy of irrigation facilities and water sources, foster possibilities and choices in how to address this in a low cost and locally managed ways.
? Inadequacy of income earning opportunities on relocation and look into the possible choices
This was particularly true for households in whose case the allotted agricultural lands were degraded, remote and lacked the basic leveling etc. As a result loss of livelihoods, poor incomes and threat to the very sustenance forced some of the families to re-migrating to the sanctuary as a possible strategy. While the sanctuary management was engaged in re-evaluating land quality for families that had complained of poor quality, the project helped to mitigate the hardship thrust upon the affected families, working on livelihood options through means of watershed development and medicinal plant cultivation. The project worked to improve agriculture practices and linked them to integrated conservation and development activities. The task however was arduous but it showed success eventually, because of the rapport and trust developed within the NGO and the communities.
Project sustainability
Yes, largely addressed through the women village institutions. They are making monthly savings and linking for the credit to banks to adress thier livelihoods actions.
Project Results
The project has completed successfully and has applied for the medium grants project of UNDP GEF under land development thematic area. Samrakshan?s Kuno Integrated Conservation and Development Project aimed to reduce the extinction threats facing the endangered Asiatic lion, by helping the process of creation of a second home for this mega-carnivore. The project aimed to improve the environment and socio economic situation of the villages displaced from this sanctuary, thereby reducing pressures on the sanctuary. Samrakshan tried to achieve this through a community-based approach that promoted conservation in a socially just manner. To the extent that we were able to recreate livelihood for villages displaced from the Kuno wildlife sanctuary, the conservation potential of the sanctuary has been improved and there is a better chance of survival for the Asiatic Lion, which is to be reintroduced into this sanctuary by the government. a. The project has yielded significant lessons relating to impact of displacement of the villages from wildlife protected areas (WPAs) on biomass dependent communities, and in view of the global significance and increasing use of such displacement as an instrument of conservation, these lessons can feed into overall policy at national and international levels. b. The plans for soil and water conservation generated by this project could definitely help to reduce biotic pressures from the Kuno wildlife sanctuary, the site for creation of a second home for the endangered Asiatic Lion. The project attempted to involve villages displaced recently from a Wildlife Protected Area (Kuno sanctuary) to take up Integrated Conservation and Development (ICDP or ecodevelopment) activities, towards restoration and recreation of livelihood options lost due to displacement. Efforts were made to identify sustainable livelihood practices that have the potential of improving land use, integrating traditional livelihoods with modern market structures, and providing continuity between former and current income-earning opportunities. Watershed activities were initiated to enhance agricultural productivity and reduce uncertainties related to erratic rainfall, while medicinal plants cultivation was seen as a means for reclaiming loss of NTFP based income as well as indigenous health practices of this forest-dependent community.
? 4 water-harvesting structures have been constructed in four villages with community participation, to benefit 318 families or nearly 1020 people of the Sahariya adivasi community.
? 6 Trainings involving 76 village level workers is also being undertaken simultaneously, in techniques of soil and water conservation and community mobilization.
? 7000 meters field bunds were made, 5 small stone weirs to check both the soil and moisture in the fields.
? The construction work resulted in generating over 5000 person days leading to in-kind community contributions of nearly 6976 USD.
? Some of key indirect impacts were community cohesivity, book-keeping and managing accounts through the formation of 7-9 Self help groups. The community capacity enhancement, in terms of awareness, knowledge and skills due to various exposure visits and trainings by experts both for men and women.
? Nearly 3-4 number of Medicinal plants nurseries raised in the village to allow easy availability of planting material for future propagation for medicinal plants cultivation.
? A reserve plot has been created in collaboration with local farmers for bulk production of saplings of commonly used medicinal plants. A qualified Ayurveda practitioner (Herbal Doctor) has been recruited to take forward the Arogya health initiative, and an Ayurveda dispensing clinic has been set up at village Agraa for propagating indigenous health traditions.
? Organisation has leveraged additional funds of nearly 20,000 USD from US based donors, Indian institutions for collective actions on soil conservation, continuation of the medicinal plants initiatives, exploring markets etc.
