Papua New Guinea - New Forest Conservation Project
Added to website: 04 May 2006
Coral Cay Conservation has recently been awarded a grant from the Darwin Initiative to undertake a community-based forest conservation project in Papua New Guinea. The Darwin Initiative is a grants programme that aims to promote biodiversity conservation and sustainable use of resources around the world. The Initiative is funded and administered by the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
The ‘Waria Valley Community Conservation and Sustainable Livelihoods Programme’, will be supported by the Darwin Initiative for the next three years. CCC will work in partnership with the people of the Waria Valley (Papua New Guinea) through their development arm organisation, the Morobe Bris Kanda (MBK), and collaborate with additional partners, to initiate the development of alternative sustainable livelihood options within the locally owned forest areas of the designated communities. This is coupled with enhanced environmental education and training programmes, contributing to the conservation and sustainable use of their forest resources. The aims of the proposed project include biodiversity assessments of the forest resources of the Waria Valley (including inventories of two traditionally important timber species: Campnospermum brevipetiolata and Hernandia ovigera); development of a GIS-based decision support system; implementation of community vegetation nurseries for restoration work; the initiation of alternative livelihood schemes (including small scale forestry and eco-tourism); coupled with environmental education, training and local capacity building programmes within the target communities. This project aims to achieve local sustainable development based on benefits derived for local land owners from local forest biodiversity. CCC will be recruiting three field staff to work on the project (based in PNG) from mid-2006.
Project History
The initial project concept was developed jointly by CCC and PNG counterparts at the Forest Research Institute (FRI) and Morobe Bris Kanda (MBK). The concept was awarded pre-project funding by the Darwin Initiative in 2005, and a project development visit was undertaken by CCC to PNG in August 2005 to meet with relevant stakeholders and community leaders. The result of the trip was the development of a full project proposal which has now been awarded a Darwin Initiative grant in 2006 for the next three years.
PNG project partners include:
Morobe Bris Kanda (MBK) – is a local development partnership that represents the people of the Waria Valley. MBK (base in Lae, northern PNG) will act as one of the main partners and has facilitated representation of key stakeholders from the Waria Valley, developing this project as a direct result of consultation with the people of Morobe area and their village counsellors, prior to approaching CCC.
Village Development Trust (VDT) – is an international development NGO based in Lae that works in partnership with MBK. The VDT has assisted in developing the community based alternative livelihood schemes and future marketing and management of the forestry and eco-tourism components of the project. (www.global.net.pg/vdt/)
PNG Forest Research Institute (FRI) – will be the second main partner for the project. FRI have been jointly involved in the resource assessment component of the project development and have agreed to provide technical support (e.g. herbarium facilities) for the forestry/inventory components, and office space for project co-ordination.
The Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) – will provide permits and approvals for the project to operate and undertake specified work within PNG.
PNG University of Technology, Dept of Forestry (UniTech) – will provide additional technical support and students to attend field-training courses ensuring training and capacity building objectives are achieved. (www.unitech.ac.pg/)
The project will be implemented by CCC in partnership with Jaquelin Fisher Associates (www.jfa.co.uk).
PNG Background
Sir Alfred Russell Wallace (contemporary of Darwin) stated that New Guinea “contains more strange and new and beautiful natural objects than any other part of the globe”. PNG forms part of the world’s third largest block of unbroken tropical rainforest. Whilst the biodiversity is globally important, it is also important to the people of PNG, with over 85% of the population living a largely subsistence lifestyle, highly dependent on natural resources for their food security and to meet basic needs. However, these resources are under continual threat from industrial logging, which only offers short-term gain to those involved.
The people of the Waria valley receive little or no direct benefits to their local communities where large-scale conventional logging has taken place. The people from these communities have voiced their concerns about the long-term environmental effects of these logging concessions and as a direct result of this the MBK was formed to work with the people to conserve their forests and environments for themselves and future generations. These forests are home to local communities and an estimated 10,000 people solely rely on these forests for food and other daily uses. The communities of the Waria Valley aspire to develop their local communities through sustainable methods (such as eco-forestry and eco-tourism) with the help and capacity of the MBK and other development NGOs. To do so this requires alternative forms of development and an increase in environmental education and awareness that would ensure the sustainability of forest resources through conservation with the aim of reducing poverty and improving the livelihoods of the local communities.
There is significant potential for meaningful and legally sanctioned community-based forestry conservation or alternative livelihood schemes which share forest benefits more equitably, which the Darwin project aims to address. MBK is well placed to provide the link between stakeholders (the village communities) and governmental decision makers. MBK is not a Government entity nor is an Association/NGO. It is a PPP (Public Private Partnership) Trusteeship that coordinates all stakeholders, which have interest and programmes/activities in the local level government of the Morobe district. MBK lack the technical expertise needed to develop suitable and sustainable management plans (such as biodiversity assessment methodologies and equipment) for the Waria Valley and surrounding areas. MBK approached CCC to help advise on these issues and to help train local and national counterparts in the expertise that it is lacking.
The project will deliver a conservation approach applicable to the local customary land tenure system, preserving an important forest ecosystem whilst permitting sustainable community forestry for local stakeholders. Trained stakeholders will benefit from alternative livelihoods whilst conserving forest resources for local and regional benefit, and enhancement of local environmental capacity will result in long-term sustainable resource use and effective conservation of the Waria Valley.
