Date: 2 October 2012
The GEF SGP ‘Community Management of Protected Areas for Conservation initiative’ (COMPACT) was prominently featured at the recent IUCN World Conservation Congress (WCC), attracting the interest of practitioners from all over the world concerned with balancing conservation and livelihoods, governance of natural resources, and protected areas. Held every four years, the IUCN WCC is considered by many the “world’s largest conservation event” that aims to improve how we collectively manage and govern our natural environment for human, social and economic development. The 2012 WCC, which took place in Jeju, Republic of Korea (6–15 September 2012), brought together over 5,000 conservation experts from 153 countries, presenting over 600 events. IUCN estimates that a total of 10,000 people participated in the Congress.
A series of events at the WCC also marked 2012 as the 40th anniversary of the World Heritage Convention, inviting a particular focus and discussion on the rights of indigenous peoples’ and local communities, stakeholder participation in UNESCO designation processes, and governance mechanisms to engage communities.
GEF SGP participated in a flagship panel convened by IUCN and UNESCO on ‘The World Heritage Convention at 40: Engaging the IUCN constituency for conservation and communities’. Terence Hay-Edie (GEF SGP, Programme Advisor) and Jessica Brown (Chair, IUCN Protected Landscapes Specialist Group) provided an overview of the COMPACT model and lessons learned, while Nellie Catzim of the Southern Environmental Association in Belize (a GEF SGP partner organization) provided the perspective of a community partner working in support of the World Heritage (WH) marine seascape. In a special session in the IUCN Protected Planet Pavilion, GEF SGP announced its forthcoming benchmark publication COMPACT: Engaging Local Communities in Stewardship of World Heritage, featuring 12 years of GEF SGP work in the COMPACT programme co-financed by the United Nations Foundation (UNF).
GEF SGP also shared its experience through presentations on the landscape/ seascape conservation model and planning frameworks in a workshop on ‘New Models for Engaging Local Communities in Stewardship of Protected Areas: Lessons from World Heritage’. Vololona Rasoarimanana (GEF SGP National Coordinator, Madagascar) and Bonifacio Tobias (COMPACT Local Coordinator, Philippines) participated in this event where they highlighted the country level experiences of GEF SGP. Held in the ‘Community Ma-eul’ space hosted by the UNDP Equator Initiative, the session included presentations on the GiZ-supported ‘Go4BioDiv’ youth programme, which targets young people in 25 World Heritage Sites (WHS) across five continents. Staff from the IUCN World Heritage Programme and the UNESCO World Heritage Centre served as respondents, exploring potential new partnerships to replicate the model. A report on the workshop can be found on the website of the Equator Initiative.
In addition, the GEF SGP team was active in a variety of other sessions at the WCC. Terence Hay-Edie gave presentations on GEF SGP’s work to support indigenous and community conserved areas and territories (ICCAs), as well as efforts to promote agro-biodiversity conservation and local biodiversity products in a well-attended two-part session organized by The Christensen Fund on ‘Transforming Agriculture, Transforming Conservation: New Partnerships for global environmental resilience and food sovereignty’. This session included a set of high-level speakers from the Sustainable Food Trust, FAO, indigenous representatives from the Potato Park in Peru, Ethiopian Highlands, and Philippines Rice Terraces, Bioversity International, and Hawaii Botanic garden.
Vololona Rasoarimanana also served as a panelist in Conservation Campus and an IUCN workshop on ‘More Effective and Equitable Nature Conservation: Lessons on Governance of Diverse Protected Areas’, joining the directors of the national park agencies of Colombia and the United States respectively. As a result of the WCC, additional partnership opportunities between GEF SGP, UNESCO WHC and IUCN will be presented at the final event of the 40th anniversary of the World Heritage Convention scheduled to take place in Kyoto, Japan, in November 2012.
Background for editors
About the GEF
The GEF unites 182 countries in partnership with international institutions, civil society organizations (CSOs), and the private sector to address global environmental issues while supporting national sustainable development initiatives. Today the GEF is the largest public funder of projects to improve the global environment. An independently operating financial organization, the GEF provides grants for projects related to biodiversity, climate change, international waters, land degradation, the ozone layer, and persistent organic pollutants.
Since 1991, GEF has achieved a strong track record with developing countries and countries with economies in transition, providing $10 billion in grants and leveraging $47 billion in co-financing for over 2,800 projects in over 168 countries. For more information, visit www.thegef.org.
About the GEF Small Grants Programme
Launched in 1992, GEF SGP supports activities of nongovernmental and community-based organizations in developing countries towards climate change abatement, conservation of biodiversity, protection of international waters, reduction of the impact of persistent organic pollutants and prevention of land degradation while generating sustainable livelihoods.
Since its creation, GEF SGP has provided over 14,500 grants to communities in over 125 developing countries. Funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) as a corporate programme, GEF SGP is implemented by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) on behalf of the GEF partnership, and is executed by the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS).
About COMPACT
Since the year 2000, the Community Management of Protected Areas Conservation (COMPACT) initiative of the UNDP-implemented GEF Small Grants Programme (GEF SGP) and the United Nations Foundation (UNF) has been working with communities near eight current/proposed World Heritage Sites in Africa, Asia, Meso-America and the Caribbean. Through extensive on-the-ground experience and a participatory methodology that integrates a scientific approach, COMPACT is demonstrating that community-based initiatives can significantly increase the effectiveness of biodiversity conservation in globally significant protected areas while helping to improve local livelihoods.
Media contacts:
- Tamara Tschentscher, KM and Communications Consultant, GEF SGP,
tamara.tschentscher@undp.org, 646-781-4353 - John Diamond, Senior Communication Officer& Spokesperson
Global Environment Facility
jdiamond@TheGEF.org, (202) 458-7953