Project Detail

Developing community capacity for implementation of a co-management mechanism in forest management in the boundary areas of Quy Hop District

Pu Huong Nature Reserve is located in the North-West of Nghe An Province in 12 communes of 5 districts. The Reserve has its core area of 49,806 ha and buffer zone of 110,883 ha. Pu Huong forest is rich in biodiveristy. Preliminary surveys have recorded 653 higher plant species, 219 vetebrates species, among which 43 plant species and 45 animal species were listed in the Red Book of Vietnam. In particular, there were 31 plant and animal species listed as globally endangered by IUCN (1996).In recent years, protecting the forests in the nature reserves and in Nghe An in general has been ineffective and faced a lot of difficulties, especially in the boundary areas between different state administration units and between forests belonging to different owners. Many forest thefts and thieves violently attacking forest rangers have become critical issues attracting great attention and concerns of local governments, relevant agencies and people. The major causes of ineffective forest protection and management in the boundary areas include:- Limited community?s awareness of and sense of responsibility for forest protection ; poverty and population growth ; lack of incentives to promote the role and participation of local governments and community in forest management ;- Responsibilities for forest management and protection are fragmented among various forest owners and based on boundaries. In addition, there is a lack of institution and mechanism for coordination and collaboration between forest owners and government forest protection forces ;- Forests in the boundary areas are often rich in large and high value timber stock. However, in these areas, there is often a lack of defined delineation betwen communes and between forests that belong to various forest owners. Furthermore, the local governments and forest protection bodies have not paid adequate attention to these areas. Thus, forest thefts occur very often in the boundary areas and the thieves could easily escape to neighboring administration areas in case they encounter a raid by the forest patrol teams. These happenings results from the lack of effective cooperation and collaboration between local governments and forest protection bodies of adjacents communes. In order to strengthen the effectiveness of forest protection and management in the boundary areas in the three communes of Chau Thai, Chau Cuong and Chau Thanh of Quy Hop District, the project aims to build and enhance the local capacity for implementation of a co-management mechanism in forest protection and management, contributing to preventing and controlling illegal forest logging and destruction by forest thefts and to conserving the biodiversity of Pu Huong Nature Reserve. Key activities of the project include establishment and enforcement of a co-management mechanism in forest management and protection in the boundary area. The project promotes the role and participation of the local governments and people and to strengthen cooperation between communal governments and forest owners in forest protection and management. The project gives priority to providing technical and financial support for the local people in livelihoods activities and help them diversify their sources of incomes to reduce illegal exploitation of forest resources.

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Project Snapshot

Grantee:

Centre for Environment and development, Union of Associations of Nghe An Province

Country:

Viet nam

Area Of Work:

Biodiversity

Operational Phase:

Phase 3

Grant Amount:

US$ 49,602.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 15,000.00

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 45,608.00

Project Number:

VN/05/003

Start Date:

1/2006

End Date:

7/2008

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

Project Characteristics and Results

Policy Impact

+ Concretization of the government?s decisions and decrees to suit local reality; clear-cut definition of the forest owners? and related agencies? responsibilities in case of indiscriminate illegal deforestation in the area under management; + Forest owners? necessary cooperation in forest management and protection in the area; development of the community?s and local government?s role in forest management and protection; + Attention to be paid on the people?s participation; the people?s share of responsibilities, duties and rights in forest management and protection

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

+ Nature conservation must be closely linked to socio-economic development. The project sets up production models suitable to natural resources and the people?s production practices so as to diversify the farmers? income, helping reduce the overexploitation of forest resources and increase the community?s income (raising pigs, fishes, local duck)

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.

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 product.

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 mass organisations 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.

Inovative Financial Mechanisms

Innovative financial mechanism - The Project Management Board formulates a revolving loan programme suitable to the project models (criteria on electing borrowing households, rights and duties of the Management Board and the borrowing households, loan duration, loan capital, interest rates ...) and asks GEF SGP financial managers and the participating communities to elect borrowing households on the basis of criteria formulated by the Project Management Board; - The Project applies the revolving loan programme to households developing income generating activities. Upon the completion of the project, the loans will be reclaimed and turned over for the building and enlargement of the models; - The project loans will be granted in kind to the borrowing households to set up the model during 3 years, including: (i) Seedlings; (ii) Fertilizer; (iii) Pesticides and insecticides - The loans will be managed by the community with simplified and effective loan formalities at interest rates similar to those regulated by the Bank for the Poor.

Capacity - Building Component

The project capacity building activities include the followings. + Training workshops in formulating and operating a mechanism of co-management in forest management and protection in the bordering forests among the 3 communes of Ch©u Thµnh, Ch©u Cêng, and Ch©u Th¸i of Quú Hîp district (will be based on the Steering Committee for the implementation of Decree No. 12CT/TTg from Quú Hîp district and the participating communes) + Training workshops in forest protection patrol (Trainees will be members of the forest protection patrol team of the communes formed by the project) + Training workshops in techniques of setting up models of income-generating activities (Trainees will be households participating the project) - Community meetings and workshops for assessment on project model building and experience sharing in co-management in forest management, community forestry and models of income-generating activities - Study tours/exchange visits to learn from other localities in in forest management, community forestry and models of income-generating activities. - 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.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

Three ethnic groups are now living in the project area: the Kinh, the Th¸i, and the Thæ. Owing to their low educational level, the Th¸i and Thæ peoples, who suffer from harsher economic conditions, have been made advantage of and hired by illegal loggers in logging. The participation of all the three peoples in the project area would mean mutual assistance in developing an awareness of forest protection, and interchange of productive experience in the models. This would help improve the peoples? living conditions and minimize destruction of the forests.

Project Results

- Main content of the projects :
? Capacity to build and operate the co-management mechanisms in forest management and protection of adjacent areas, the consent and active participation of forest owners and local communities. Co-management mechanisms to meet the following requirements:
o Promoting the participation and enhance the coordination of government departments, forest owners and communities.
o Having a clear organizational structure, clearly defining responsibilities and powers of the parties.
o Based on the experience of these programs, mechanisms have been made to develop local mechanisms in accordance with local practice, particularly the agents of the border area. Enhance and strengthen the activities of the Steering Committee directives of the District 12, the Steering Committee made 12 of social indicators. Take the economic strength to promote the role of the government district, commune and the involvement and cooperation of all the parties in forest management, ensuring the protection of Pu Huong Nature Conservation Areas by General team of youth volunteers, forest Quy Hop, government, police, ranger district / commune project participants, communities in 3 communes involved in the project.
o Focus on the community's participation, shared responsibilities, obligations and interests in local forest management.
o Focus on capacity building for management authorities, government departments and people.
o A mechanism to monitor the implementation of mechanisms and sustainable financing mechanisms.
o A legal basis by the People's Committee issued Quy Hop district, supervising the implementation mechanism.
? Establish patrol control of social protection, social organization based on joint patrol base platoon strength of the town and put into operation.
? Develop models of production, diversification of income sources for farmers in accordance with natural resources and production practices of the people.
? Raising awareness in the community, promoting the role of community participation to prevent illegal logging and operation of forestry.

- Pilot phase result:
? The total project has made the development of production models: 299 652 000 e, where pig farming: 95.672 million dong; cattle: 133 950 000 e; fish: 5,530,000 e and set 3 veterinary medicine cabinets built in 3 communes, the total amount: 64.5 million e. On average, each commune received VND 100 million. Structure between cattle, pigs, fish is on the needs of local communities in the key of each commune, so the number of households to borrow money to raise cattle, fish, pigs in different villages, even both the social structure is also different. In Chau Thanh from the receipt of capital has now turned round three times (with 3 waves of household loans) also in Chau Cuong commune, Chau Thai only 1 weekly household borrowing.
? There are 4/7 villages in the project area have established credit groups. Total project has established 15 groups (seven groups of pigs, four cows and four groups of fish groups)
? Loan term: pig model for the loan period is 2 years and 2 years bog farming and fish farming one year.
? Interest rate: In an interest rate of bank lending social policy at the time the project is 0.5% / month.
? This type of loan: Project contact livestock breeding centers in Nghe An province to provide pig and fish for the project, households received pigs, fish and transfer money to projects like the Center. The purchase of cattle to buy seed in comfort and order, technical staff supervise the purchase of cattle households participating in the project.

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