Bovilla artificial lake is responsible for providing approximately 50% of the drinking water supply for the capital town of Albanian with a population that is quickly approaching the 500,000 thousand inhabitants. The area has been in the focus of heated public debate regarding the need for protecting this strategic water reserve from anthropogenic pollution and land degradation as the result of overgrazing and forest cutting.
The solution to this problem is to be found in a series of preventive and corrective actions that involve local communities. Land tenure transfer from State forest to Communal forest, demonstration and testing of integrated land management models and giving to the area a legal protection status are some of the action to be taken.
This project will demonstrate models of integrated land management such as grazing control, slope stabilization, construction of small barrages on mountain streams for sediment retention as well as tree planting