2018 marks the 25^th Anniversary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, signed into force less than a matter of months after the announcement of the Darwin Initiative. With such close creations, it is unsurprising that the CBD has helped shape the nature of Darwin Initiative projects over the past 25 years, embodying core biodiversity values and objectives that the Darwin Initiative seeks to achieve. The latest edition of the Darwin Newsletter, released on the International Day for Biological Diversity, is a celebration of this Anniversary, exploring how current projects are trying to meet CBD objectives 25 years later.

The core objectives of the CBD are: the conservation of biological diversity; the sustainable use of biodiversity components; and the fair and equitable use of any benefits arising from the use of biodiversity resources. In this series of blogs, we will be looking at projects which exemplify these objectives. In our first blog, we will be looking at two projects in Africa focused on conservation of biological diversity through community engagement and collaborative efforts. Our second blog will focus on sustainable usage of biodiversity components, visiting a sustainable hunting project in Cameroon and a water management project in Kenya’s Tana River Delta. Finally, our third blog of the series will look at the award-winning benefit sharing programme in Myanmar supported by the Darwin Initiative.

Community conservation of wild Arabica coffee – people and the Convention on Biological Diversity

Arabica coffee is found growing wild only in Ethiopia, and an adjoining area of South Sudan. Hence it is a genetic resource for which Ethiopia is responsible under the Convention on Biological Diversity. One of the last remaining major blocks of natural forests, in the south-west of the country, is one area where this wild coffee is found.

With support from the Darwin Initiative, the University of Huddersfield and Ethio Wetlands and Natural Resources Association undertook an analysis of the causes of forest loss. From this analysis, the Wild Coffee Conservation by Participatory Forest Management (PFM) project was developed to assist the government in revising the regional forest policy to give communities forest-based rights and responsibilities.

Basket of ripe coffee cherries picked off mountain forest plots cleared for coffee cultivation, Credit – Sheko Woreda, SNNPR

PFM was developed at the village communities as they were found to be most knowledgeable about the forest and have strong links to specific areas. At that level, forest management groups were elected to undertake management and monitoring. The communities also established cooperatives to market sustainably harvested forest produce, the income from which helps cover the costs of the monitoring and protection of the forest.

This work has slowed forest loss from 2.6% per year outside the PFM forest to 0.18% per year inside the PFM forest, with over 76,000ha of forest now under PFM. Analysis using the Shannon Diversity Index showed that biodiversity has been maintained within natural forest, which contains the wild coffee stands. The wild coffee is now mapped and included in the community forest management plans which are jointly monitored each year with the government.

By getting forest rights and livelihood benefits for the forest fringe dwelling communities Darwin support has helped turn degraded, “open access” forest into actively managed forests where communities protect a unique global genetic resource – your morning Arabica coffee.

Elephant conservation through community empowerment in Mali

Elephant migration, Credit – Carlton Ward Photography

An internationally important population, the Mali elephants are remarkable for how they have managed to survive when all others around them have disappeared. They make the longest annual migration of all elephants, picking their way through this harsh environment to find the resources they require, and avoiding human activity as much as possible.

After studying their migration for 3 years it became clear that they were at the limit of their ability to adapt any further. Their migration route needed to be preserved in its entirety, although conflict was rising as human activity was spreading and intensifying throughout the range. As this covered approximately 32,000km (somewhere between the size of Belgium and Switzerland) a landscape approach that involved the local people was essential.

The award-winning Mali Elephant Project has received two grants from the Darwin Initiative, the first of which supported the development of a model of community empowerment in resource management. Its work is to bring all parts of the community together to create a common perception of the problems they face before determining solutions.

The second grant of these grants currently supports the development of women-led initiatives to generate income from practices that encourage the wise use of natural resources in key areas in the elephant range. Working with women is a quietly powerful way of providing strong support, influence, and additional incentives as an alternative to often-destructive, traditionally male-dominated natural resource management structures. The training empowers women to collectively generate additional income enabling them to take an active role in local decisions relating to resource use by promoting the protection of sustainable use zones and regeneration of degraded land.

Women’s association harvesting medicinal plants, Credit – WILD Foundation

Empowering local people to prevent outsiders and urban commercial interests from abusive resource extraction is popular and the local benefits of “elephant-centred” resource management have provided the foundation for a successful anti-poaching strategy and the creation of a protected area based on the biosphere reserve model.

For the full version of both these articles, please see the May 2018 edition of the Darwin Newsletter. For more information on the Ethiopia Coffee Participatory Forest Management Project click here. Mali Elephant Project is a joint initiative of the WILD Foundation and the International Conservation Fund of Canada. See https://www.wild.org/mali-elephants/ and http://icfcanada.org/our-projects/projects/mali_elephants . If you are interested in learning more about the Darwin projects click here: 19-010 or 23-022.