Project Detail

Biodiversity conservation by sustainable land management in the Wum lake ecosystem

This project are to identify and access the applicability of potential conservation farming techniques, build the capacity of indigenous communities around the Lake Ecosystem in sustainable land management and facilitate a shift from the currently practised slash and burn to sustainable land management practices based on a sustainable land management and integrated ecosystem management principles in the lake area.
The approach taken is a participatory integrated community based land management and biodiversity conservation that will fully involve the indigenous people (herders) and native farmers (croppers). The project will also consider gender mainstreaming and involve women, youths (boys and girls) and persons with disabilities.

The project is necessary because Wum Lake is a touristic site and also considered to be of outstanding local and National importance for conservation of its biodiversity, most of which are endemic in the North West Region.

The project is located in the Wum Lake Ecosystem and targets the herders, an indigenous landless minority group of Muslim background who live in the area in scattered hamlets and depend on livestock keeping and subsistent agriculture for their livelihoods. The project also targets the native croppers (particularly women) of the surrounding communities and youths. It comprises 4 main activities. By accomplishing these activities, the project would have achieved the goals and specific objectives of sustainable land management and it will adopt local capacity building in sustainable land management, integrated ecosystem management and climate change mitigation.

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Project Snapshot

Grantee:

ORGANIZATION FOR INTEGRATED RURAL DEVELOPMENT

Country:

Cameroon

Area Of Work:

Biodiversity
Biodiversity
Biodiversity

Operational Phase:

OP5-Y3 (Jul 13 - Jun 14)

Grant Amount:

US$ 48,020.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 23,851.00

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 25,242.00

Project Number:

CMR/SGP/OP5/Y3/STAR/BD/13/10

Start Date:

7/2013

End Date:

12/2014

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

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Project Characteristics and Results

Notable Community Participation

- 20 indigenous people and native farmers (8 men, 12 women) will be trained to become trainers of other men and women of the other communities to actively participate in Conservation Farming and integrated ecosystem management techniques in the Lake area.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

- Direct beneficiaries of the project will include indigenous Mbororo people and indigenous dwellers in the Lake area. The project comprises of training of trainers workshops for indigenous people and 3 training workshops in sustainable land management for indigenous people. They will apply the training to train other indigenous people to practice Conservation Farming and Integrated Ecosystem Management and actively participate in the conservation of the biodiversity and soils.

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

- Indigenous Women?s Sustainable Development Fund of 1000 members (200 men, 800 women) will be created to give out low interest loans to the members to enable them carryout appropriate sustainable alternative income generating activities, thus reducing their dependence on the lake ecosystem.

Capacity - Building Component

- The project has several capacity building activities such as training of 20 native farmers and indigenous herders as Trainers in Sustainable Land Management, Integrated Ecosystem Management and carbon sequestration techniques. It also has a training program for 50 native farmers and herders (20 men, 30 women) in conservation farming, integrated ecosystem management and agroforestry techniques.

Gender Focus

- The sensitization meetings and training workshops will focus particularly women. They will be trained and directly supported and encouraged to experiment themselves with the techniques and expand their knowledge base as well as organise themselves. They will be in a strong position to continue improving their Land Management and Integrated Ecosystem Management techniques. In addition, an indigenous Women?s Sustainable Fund will be created and a management Committee will be elected and trained to ensure financial sustainability and Land Management and Integrated Ecosystem Management in the Lake Ecosystem.

Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment

The project comprises a Community Outreach Programme for Sustainable Land Management and Conservation and Sustainable Community-based natural resources management through a public education and awareness programme that will use local and traditional means of communication. The programme will produce radio programmes in local languages (Mbororo, Aghem) for the sensitization of the native farmers and indigenous Mbororo Communities on climate change, unsustainable slash-and-burn farming practices, and biodiversity and land degradation.

Project sustainability

The project has put in place a number of local governance structures that will ensure project continuity when external support will cease. . Trained a core of trainers to continue to train and recycle community promoters and raise awareness. . 15 caretakers trained to monitor grazing and farming activities in the lake area. ? Trained and supported indigenous women in 1.6. as ? An indigenous Women?s Sustainable Development Fund has been put in place to continue to provide financial remediation till the project will become self supportive.

Policy Impact

The project includes a component of 4 consultation meetings which target policy makers, decision makers, traditional rulers and leaders of indigenous people?s Communities. This component will increase the awareness of policy makers and local government officials of the need for an Integrated Ecosystem Management and Conservation Farming approach to agriculture as well as increase their willingness to include ecological principles in agricultural planning and extension activities. Through the awareness and consultation activities, it is expected that the project would contribute to the mainstreaming of Conservation Farming and Integrated Ecosystem Management (IEM) Concepts in policy and decision-making process.

Replication of project activities

The project involved government services and is closely linked to the convention on Biodiversity Conservation to which the government of Cameroon is a signatory. It is therefore sure that the government will continue to support similar projects in other communities. Mistakes that should be avoided are exclusion of women from the decision making process, designing projects that do not take income generation and local capacity building into consideration. Another mistake to be avoided is providing infrastructure for the beneficiary communities without explicit ownership.

Policy Influence

Through the awareness and consultation activities, it is expected that the project would contribute to the mainstreaming of Conservation Farming and Integrated Ecosystem Management (IEM) Concepts in policy and decision-making process.

Inovative Financial Mechanisms

Under the capacity building component, the project will create an Indigenous Women?s Sustainable Development Fund and train its members and a Management Committee in project finance management and Appropriate Sustainable Alternative Income Generating Activities.

Project Results

*Organization of 02 consultative meetings with decision makers and major stakeholders to raise and increase their awareness on the need for scaling up and replication of the Community ? Based Conservation and Sustainable use of biological resources in other communities and parts of the North West Region: 02 consultation meetings organized and 14 decision makers (10 men, 04 women) consulted.

*Community outreach information and radio programme: 10.000 information brochures and disseminated.
200 persons participate in the meetings (50 men, 150 women). 20.000 persons reached instead of 15.000.
12 radio broadcasts made in local languages.

*Training of Trainers in Integrated Ecosystem Management and Sustainable Land Management and carbon sequestration techniques: 02 workshops planned and executed and 08 crop farmers trained (o3 men, 05 women).

*Training of 50 crop farmers and indigenous herders in sustainable Land Management and carbon sequestration techniques: 03 workshops executed; 20 crop farmers (08 men, 12 women) trained; 30 indigenous herders (12 men, 08 women) trained out of 30 planned.

*Training of indigenous women in IGAs: bee farming: 50 indigenous women acquire skills in honey and wax production and marketing in co-operative and book keeping.

*Establishment of tree nurseries: Community nurseries of 10.000 seedlings instead of 4; 6 individual nurseries of 5.000 seedlings. 15 crop farmers (8 men, 7 women) participating out of 20 18 herders (11 men, 7 women) participating out of 18.

* A 15 member committee (8men, 7women), two village management committees of which 01 comprises indigenous people and 01comprising crop farmers and participatory management rules are formulated implanted and enforce.

* A 15 member committee (8men, 7women), two village management committees of which 01 comprises indigenous people and 01comprising crop farmers and participatory management rules are formulated implanted and enforce.

* Three farms of about 01 hectare each, were selected around the Lake area and planted with four species of fruit trees (guava, plum, mangoes and oranges) which will serve as food for farmers and other members of the community in the near future. Maesopsis were also planted which will serve as shade for farmers, wind breaks and will also prevent soil erosion and increase soil fertility and also serve as fodder for cattle rearers.

* 25 community members were supported with seedlings to establish private individual nurseries. After training community members on establishment of nurseries, they were supported with seeds to each establish private nurseries. Following this, 25 private nurseries were established and two central nurseries were created, one for the local community and the other for the indigenous people.

*Training modules and training reports available, 50 indigenous women bee farmers trained and directly supported to carry out bee farming, a management committee of 12 members put in place.

*52 indigenous people (5 men and 47 women) were directly supported to carry out Income Generating Activities through the creation of the Indigenous Women?s Sustainable Development Fund while 1000 indigenous people were directly supported.

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Indicators

Biophysical

Hectares of globally significant biodiversity area protected or sustainably managed by project 12

Biophysical

Tonnes of CO2 decreased or avoided by energy efficient and renewable energy technologies or applying environmentally sustainable transport practices introduced by SGP Project 11270

Biophysical

Hectares of degraded land rest 20

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