GEF Small Grants Programme Supports Communities in Their Efforts to Preserve and Restore Forests
The GEF Small Grants Programme (SGP) recognizes the importance of raising awareness on the value of the forests. Therefore it is joining the world community in celebration of the International Year of Forests. The Small Grants Programme believes that communities play a fundamental role in protecting, restoring and influencing local and national policies on forests. Since 1992, the SGP has supported over 2,900 projects related to the protection and restoration of forests. These community-based projects helped to preserve over 13 million hectares of forest from human and non human impacts, and to restore over 1,7 billion hectares of degraded forest land.
A great example of such work of SGP with communities is the case of SGP Iran project “Galazani: A Traditional Forest Management System “. This project was implemented in the Havareh Khol village near the town of Baneh in the northern part of Zagros Mountain Range in west of Iran. The area consists of 347 ha of forest with valuable species of Oak, 120 ha of rangelands, 77ha of farm fields, 3 ha residential areas and 30 hectares of destroyed forests. Traditionally, wood and fodder were provided through an indigenous method called “Galazani”, or in technical terms, pollarding, which means trimming the newly born branches of trees up and down the stem and storing them to be used in winter. “Galazani” was not only a way to collect needed fodder and wood but also an indigenous forest management skill.
Upon nationalization of forests in 1963 private exploitation of forests, including cutting wood for fuel and branches for fodder, were banned by government and authorities. However, this project served to compile, register and improve “Galazani” as an efficient traditional method of forest management. The project was supported by the Faculty of Natural Resources at Tehran University, and the Department of Forestry in Kurdistan province. Since the method was the same as traditional methods applied by local inhabitants, the community played a significant role in both providing the traditional know -how and in implementing the technique.
The project was very successful. Participation of indigenous people resulted in outstanding achievements during the first year, which led to increased academic interest in the method. Successful project implementation also triggered subsequent changes in the National Forestry Policies. In 2004, the project received an Award as Best National Project in the field of Natural Resources Management. As a result of this project another SGP project was executed in the neighboring area, Armardeh, to continue the tradition of using the improved “Galazani” technique as the dominnat forest management method in the region.
The SGP project “The Living Fence and the Jungle School: Protecting the Orang Rimba and their forest Home” from SGP Indonesia is another great community-led initiative. This project supported the Orang Rimba (People of the Jungle) in their goal of protecting the forest and conserving important biodiversity. Orang Rimba is an indigenous community that resides in a forest in the Bukit Dua Belas National Park in Sumatra. Given their low level of literacy the community used participatory video techniques to create their project proposal and to monitor the project. This flexible approach allowed the indigenous community to successfully implement the project. The results include protection of Sumatran low land forests, and preservation of the habitats of endangered species such as the Jambi giant trees (Dipterocarpus sp.), the Tapir (Tapirus indicus), the Hornbill bird (Buceros virgil) and the Siamang Gibbon (Hylobates agilis).
SGP’s role in forest protection has also been manifested through the partnership of SGP with the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in the Green Wave Campaign, a global biodiversity campaign to educate children and youth about biodiversity. Each year, The Green Wave contributes to worldwide celebrations of the International Day for Biological Diversity (IDB) where participating schools plant locally adapted and important tree species in or near their schoolyard with the help of students. Conscious of the role of future generations in preserving forests, the SGP has been a key partner of this initiative and has piloted the Green Wave campaign in countries like Belize, Egypt, Tunisia, Eritrea, Mauritius, Chile, Nicaragua, and Trinidad and Tobago.
The SGP has reinforced its commitment in supporting community initiatives on protecting forests in its strategy for the Fifth Operational Phase of the Program. The SGP will once again support activities that reduce pressures on forests and generate sustainable flows of forest ecosystems services, as well as activities which strengthen the enabling environment to reduce green- house gas emissions resulting from deforestation and degradation of forest. These activities aim to further engage local communities in transforming their landscapes by participating in protective and productive forest management activities for improved socio-economic livelihoods.
The decisions at the Earth Summit in 1992 and all subsequent international negotiations systematically call for the inclusion of forest management in investment programmes, including at the community level. Alongside with other initiatives, SGP will address this need by acting as a catalyst for the REDD-plus mechanisms and by incentivizing the involvement of traditional and local communities in the process.
About the GEF Small Grants Programme
Launched in 1992, 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 SGP has provided grants to 12,000 communities in 122 developing countries. Funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) as a corporate programme, 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).
Contact person: Ana Maria Currea, Knowledge Management Facilitator, GEF SGP,
ana.maria.currea@undp.org
As part of GEF's support to the International Year of Forest, every month we are publishing a story about a successful GEF project that is promoting sustainable forest management, and having positive impacts on forests, climate, biodiversity and local livelihoods.