Project Detail

Conservation and development of genetic resources of Cinamomum Cassia. in traditional growing areas in Viet Nam

Vietnam is one of the Vavilov?s ?Centre of Origin? of domesticated plants and animals and is one of 10 centres of highest biodiversity in the world. The total number of native plant species found in Vietnam is estimated at 4,800. Of these 1,900 are food plants or cultivated plants and their wild relatives.

Cinnamomum species belongs to the plant family of Lauracea which is a typical plant family of tropical forest in South East Asia. Due to overexploitation of Cinnamomum, it does not exist in natural forest anymore. People have domesticated this for a long time. There is a high species and varietal diversity of Cinnamomum in Vietnam. Indigenous species and varieties of Cinamomum are well-adapted to variations in the climatic conditions and traditional experience of the ethnic minorities.

In Vietnam, there are four traditional Cinnamomum growing areas, including Dong Trieu (Quang Ninh), Van Yen (Yen Bai), Que Chau (Nghe An), Thuong Xuan (Thanh Hoa), Tra Mi (Quang Nam), Tra Bong (Quang Ngai). The area and yield of Cinnamomum have significantly increased in recent years thanks to product export. There is big potential for expanding growing area of Cinnamomum in Viet Nam.

However, indigenous Cinnamomum production is still under developed and unsustainable. One of the urgent issues to be addressed in order to pursue sustainable Cinnamomum production is to prevent the loss of indigenous Cinnamomum species and varieties. The main causes of the loss are attributed to the lack of awareness and understanding of the local authorities and relevant agencies, and communities on the importance of agrobiodiversity conservation in general and conservation of indigenous Cinnamomum species and varieties. This has resulted in the replacement of indigenous species and varieties by others which are imported from different eco-geographical areas, resulting in reduction in area of indigenous Cinnamomum cultivation. Another major cause is a lack of mechanism to control market of Cinnamomum seeds. In addition, there is the problem of unsustainable methods of harvesting seeds.

The project will be located in 3 specific sites of traditional Cinnamomum growing areas in Viet Nam, including Van Yen (Yen Bai), Thuong Xuan (Thanh Hoa) and Tra Bong (Quang Ngai). The project will assist to mitigate the threats to the loss of genetic resources of indigenous Cinnamomum species and varieties and preserve their genetic diversity. Its activities include:
? Increasing community awareness and understanding on agrobiodiversity conservation
? Conducting inventory surveys and implement an inventory monitoring program on indigenous Cinnamomum in project areas
? Establishing seed gardens/stands to preserve indigenous Cinnamomum.
? Developing community model on sustainable Cinnamomum cultivation
? Building technical capacity for local relevant agencies and community on conservation and sustainable cultivation and production of indigenous Cinnamomum
? Documenting traditional knowledge and experience of ethnic minorities on indigenous Cinnamomum cultivation and production
? Developing community regulations to promote indigenous Cinnamomum.
? Establishing links between the three project sites for mutual exchange of information and lessons learned

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Project Snapshot

Grantee:

The Forestry Science Technology Association of Thanh Hoa Pro

Country:

Viet nam

Area Of Work:

Biodiversity

Operational Phase:

Phase 2

Grant Amount:

US$ 40,903.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 1,836.07

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 18,852.00

Project Number:

VN/02/006

Start Date:

8/2003

End Date:

6/2006

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

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Project Characteristics and Results

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

- The project mainly involved the Th¸i people (in Ngäc Phông) and the K' Ho people (in Trµ Thuû). This was of great significance, as their educational background is still very low, especially the K' Ho. - The communities? competence has been enhanced by experts and they got to understand more about biodiversity conservation, the significance as well the importance of biodiversity in human life. And the greatest advantage is that they are living by the forests, an environment with the most abundant features of biodiversity. - Thanks to the study tours organized by the project to major cities such as HuÕ and Hµ Néi, the people of these communities has the chance to better their understanding and see with their own eyes the nation?s advances after 20 years of renovation.

Replication of project activities

- The agriculture sector of Thanh Ho¸ and Quang Ngai provinces have started the planning of forestry development for Thuong Xuan and Tra Bong districts, in which Cinamomum is one of the key forest plants. - Managing and using efficiently the seedlings of the project nurseries. - The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development evaluates and issues certificates of producing seedlings to be supplied for growing Cinamomum in the province.

Policy Impact

- The government reforestation programme (known as the 5 million ha of forest programme) aims to reforest, especially for the barren land, for the purposes of environemntal protection and economic development. The project models fit well with this government programme and therefore will be applied, contributing to forest protection and development in the project area.

Notable Community Participation

- The project gives priority to community participation. During the project design phase, knowledge and traditions of local people were studied and taken into consideration in project design. The local people were in consultations about the project issues and solutions at community meetings and through surveys/interviews. In order to promote the role and responsibilities and to ensure community ownership, during the project implementation and M&E, the project will: - Provide the community with full information on the project. Representatives from the community will be given the opportunities to attend project opening, mid term and final meetings, and project workshops. - Give community opportunities to participate in all project activities. - The project team will develop the revolving loan mechanism to assist the participating community in purchasing the materials for the project model building. The community select among themselves the participating community based on the selection criteria developed by the project team. The community manage the revolving loan programme. - The community is given opportunities in project monitoring and evaluation. - Mobilising the community to invest their labor and resources in model building. - The project take into consideration the community needs and cultivation techniques when developing training materials. - The community ownership, benefit and participation are cornerstone in project implementation and M&E.

Policy Influence

- The project has had definite impact on the State forestry management agencies (the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development) in setting up the Cinamomum area of the province with genetic sources supplied by licensed seed gardens and forests. - In the strategy of forestry development of Thêng Xu©n district, Cinamomum is defined as a key plant in planting protection and production forests, in plantations and home gardens to reform gardens with various plants.

Gender Focus

- Women are given prioroties in the project capacity building activities and revolving loan programme. - Women take part in most activities of the project model building, including making seedlings, planting, caring, harvesting, and selling products.

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

? Tra Bong is a mountainous district in Quang Ngai province, including 3 communes with King people and 7 communes with ethnic people (the Kor). The total natural area was 41,876 ha, in which forest land, agriculture, occupied land, land for house and unused land accounted for 18,634.10 hectares, 4008.78 ha, 38.62 ha, 194.83 ha and 18,559 respectively. The district consisted of 6361 households, 29,417 people (including 3689 Kor ethnic households, accounting for 58%). Livelihood was mainly farming, shifting cultivation and burning forest garden economy of ethnic Kor is cinnamon. The total area of planted cinnamon across the district was 600 hectares.

Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment

Promoting public awareness of global environment 1. One of the key objectives of the project is to enhance awareness and understanding of the project stakeholders on the following issues. - global environmental issues such as biodiversity conservation, climate change, land degradation and desertification - linkage between poverty and enviornemntal degradation - enviornemntal protection and sustainable development - millenium development goals (MDGs) 2. The project has awareness raising activities on global enviornmental issues, focusing on the project issue of conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity of forest ecosystem. - Oragnising training workshops, dialogues, community contests on the issue of conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity of forest ecosystem - Mainstreaming the project issue in the farmers? association activities and programmes - Using public media when possible - Attending in exchange visits, workshops and environmental communication activities organised by GEF SGP where GEF issues are discussed.

Capacity - Building Component

The project capacity building activities include the followings. - Training workshops in Cinamomum conservation - Community meetings and workshops for assessment on project model building and experience sharing in Cinamomum conservation - Study tours/exchange visits to learn from other localities in Cinamomum conservation - Training items include (1) techniques in selecting the mother trees, (2) techniques in developing nurseries of Cinamomum, (3) Cinamomum cultivation techniques (4) techniques in transforming Cinamomum garden/forest into seed garden/stand. - In addition to the project capacity building activities, the project team members attend exchange visits, training workshops on project design and implementation, M&E as well as themtaic workshops for sharing experience and lessons learned organised by GEF SGP. - In addition to the project capacity building activities, key community members attend exchange visits, themtaic workshops for sharing experience and lessons learned organised by GEF SGP. - Training participants are project participating farmers, and commune key farmers and extension workers of participating commune. Emphasis on sustainable livelihoods - Cinamomum is one of the 4 species of Vietnamese Cinamomum distributed in the provinces of Central Vietnam, Thanh Ho¸ and Qu¶ng Ng?i included. - The main product from Cinamomum - its oil - is extracted from every part of the tree: leaves, roots, and mainly bark. Besides, wood from Cinamomum trees has been of valuable use. During feudal times, the Cinamomum tree of Thêng Xu©n was referred to as the ?precious cinnamomum tree of Thêng district". - Cinamomum trees can be consumed in both domestic and export markets. - Cinamomum trees play an important role in the lives of the mountainous ethnic groups of the 2 communes of Trµ Thuû and Ngäc Phông. The Th¸i people used to hand down Cinamomum trees to later generations as hairdo. The more trees inherited, the richer the family was considered. - Maintaining the development of this valuable genetic resources will help increase the people?s income, improve their living, and could make them better-off when they are allocated large forest areas.

Project sustainability

The project will be sustainable thanks to the followings. - Enhanced awareness and understanding and capacity of the local authorities and communities on enviornmental issues in general and biodiversity conservation - The project models demonstrate the environmental and economic benefit of conservation of genetic resources of Cinamomum - Cinamomum is defined as one of the key plants of Thêng Xu©n and Trµ Bång districts to reform gardens with various plants, to be planted pangamically in protection and production forests, to develop the economy of households and communities, and to ensure the sustainability and socio-economic value of the project. - The local communities benefit from the project training activities and know how to conserve and cultivate Cinamomum. This together with the economic benefit of the Cinamomum will ensure that the communities will expand to grow Cinamomum in their areas.

Planning non gef grant

The relevant local agencies have developed plans to grow Cinamomum in their 5 million ha forest programme and encouraged the local communities to grow Cinamomum.

Inovative Financial Mechanisms

To conserve Cinamomum and to put transformed Cinamomum seedling gardens into the structure of local forestry seedlings to supply seeds to the provincial reforestation programs, the participating households were encouraged to plant seed forests to supply quality seeds in the production of Cinamomum seedlings.

Project Results

1. Awareness and understanding of local authorities and communities in the project area enhanced
- The project grantee organisation and local authorities have learned and gained experience in managing an international-funded project and have opportunities to conserve the genetic resources of Cinamomum, contributing to the government programme on 5 million ha forest
- The project community have had the opportunity to improve their knowledge on cultivation of Cinamomum and agro forestry development, sustainable land magement techniques, and better income generation from Cinamomum growing
- The activities and results of the project have had impact on the awareness of the communities, the government authorities, and related sectors and agencies from commune to district levels on conserving biodiversity and the biodiversity of Xu©n Liªn Natural Reserve of Thêng Xu©n district in particular and defining the responsibility of maintaining and developing the Cinamomum species once known to many as ?the precious cinnamon-tree of Thuong Xuan District?, ?Cinnamon: offerings to the King?.
- This better awareness of the value of the Cinamomum in developing the household economy as well as the livelihood of the whole region has led to the following practical moves:
+ The communities came to an agreement to carry out the regulation of managing, conserving and developing the genetic resources of Cinamomum. They are also more active in planting Cinamomum in their own gardens, in the plantations and in the reforested areas projected by the State.
+ The People?s Committees of Ngoc Phung and Tra Thuy communes have decided on enlarging the area of planting the Cinamomum in home gardens , bare hills and mountains, and in plantations.
+ The People?s Committee of Ngäc Phông and Tra Thuy communes carried out the enlargement of the area of planting Cinamomum in accordance with the district?s plan of forestry development until the year 2010.
+ The Departments of Agriculture and Rural Development of the 2 provinces have decided to include Cinamomum into the plant structure for protection forest according to the 5 million ha programme; decided to evaluate the quality of conserved Cinamomum and the transformed seed garden so as to include Cinamomum into the system of forestry plant species of these provinces; and used the project?s technical materials for the staff of the district centers for agro-forestry promotion to train the communities in conserving and developing the genetic resources of Cinamomum in these localities.

2. The project has brought benefit for the communities
a. The communities were given training opportunities in conserving the genetic resources of Cinamomum.
Successfully tested the project models on conservation of genetic resources of Cinamomum
- Survey and investigation on evaluation report on the status of Cinamomum at the 2 localities:
+ in Ngoc Phung commune, Thuong Xuan district, Thanh Ho¸ province presently there are 17 families planting Cinamomum on an area of 10.5 ha with 90% of Cinamomum under 10 years of age;
+ in Tra Thuy commune there remains 300ha of Cinamomum forests, mainly of trees under 10 years of age.

- Building 2 nurseries of Cinamomum of 500m2. each
+ the nursery of Tra Thuy commune produced over 30,660 standard Cinamomum trees (90.2 %)
+ the nursery of Ngoc Phung commune 35,910 standard Cinamomum trees (92.9 %). These trees obtained heights of 25-30 cm and diameters of 4-5mm.

- Selecting 250 Cinamomum trees for conservation (125 trees/commune), in which 61.5% have had flowers and fruits for the production of seedlings.

- Transforming 18 ha of existing Cinamomum gardens and forests into seedling gardens:
+ Ngoc Phung commune: 8 ha
+ Tra Thuy commune: 10 ha

- Planting 22 ha of new Cinamomum forests with seedlings supplied by the 2 nurseries of the project:
+ Ngoc Phung commune: 12 ha
+ Tra Thuy commune: 10 ha
Cinamomum in this area was planted pangamically and in an agro forestry model. After one year, the trees obtained a survival rate of 90.1 %, with a height of 0.6m and a diameter at the stump of 5.5mm.

Community regulations
Based on the Law of Forest Protection and Development, with reference to instructions by the Department of Agriculture and Rural Administration of Thanh Hoa and Quang Ngai provinces, the project has established 2 community regulations for the 2 communes of Tra Thuy and Ngoc Phung on the conservation and development of genetictic resources of Cinamomum. the People?s Committees of Thuong Xuan and Tra Bong approved these regulations for implementation.

Compiling technical materials on conserving and developing genetictic resources of Cinamomum with the following contents:
+ Criteria of selecting Cinamomum for conservation
+ Techniques of selecting Cinamomum
+ Techniques of producing Cinamomum seedlings, and building and managing nurseries.
+ Techniques of planting intensively Cinamomum forests
+ Techniques of transforming existing Cinamomum gardens/forests into seed forests.
The materials have been assessed as ?Fair? by the Union of Science and technology of Associations Thanh Ho¸ province and the Department of Science and Technology of Quang Ngai province.

- The project has developed a good working relationship between the project grantee, GEF SGP, and the local authorites and relevant agencies at the procince level, including the Department of agriculture and rural development.

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