Grant Call 1: inspiring locally-led restoration

In aiming to strengthen legal frameworks in the Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo and empower Indigenous Peoples to protect and manage their forest landscapes, this project assesses legal gaps and supports Indigenous Peoples to document customary land use, strengthen community governance, and advocate for reforms in land, resource, climate and biodiversity policy.

This project supports Indigenous young women in West Kalimantan to become leaders in environmental stewardship. Through leadership training, community-based environmental projects, and an emphasis on traditional knowledge, they are enhancing climate and ecological resilience, and gender equality in three regions where young women are often underrepresented. 

Indigenous Peoples are gaining more control over their ecosystems, helping to restore ecological and cultural services in the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve, Western Ghats. This community-based ecological restoration project provides communities with support and scientific tools for mapping and removing invasive species, and planting native ones. 

To address environmental degradation in Tanzania, this initiative is implementing a locally-led credit-based mechanism which creates an incentive for smallholder farmers to develop agrobiodiversity. Local stakeholders lead the way in action research that is designing and testing this credit system for sustainable resource use with agricultural productivity.

Agroecological practices and Indigenous knowledge are being brought to the fore in a wetland stewardship programme that addresses biodiversity loss in the Gulshan-Baridhara Lake peri-urban area in Bangladesh. The project aims to help achieve this locally-led stewardship through participatory wetland assessments, co-creation of restoration and management tools, and the development of green entrepreneurship.

Extended periods of drought in northwest Namibia have caused substantial declines in wildlife and livestock, threatening local livelihoods. This project focuses on local knowledge and spatial data to help understand factors affecting wildlife populations. The results will inform strategies aimed at helping wildlife and livelihoods recover after droughts, which can be supported by the Legacy Landscape Fund and others.

Community-led research in the Huye and Gisagara districts of Rwanda is evaluating the effectiveness of country-wide climate strategies and policies. The findings from this work are being used by smallholder communities in their development of agroforestry and natural regeneration and in their approaches to policy engagement for locally-led action to reverse environmental degradation.t

In some places in the Nepalese Himalayas, forest degradation and biodiversity loss persist due to restoration policies and carbon management practices that prioritise monocrops. This project combines ecological data and traditional knowledge, to help co-develop ecologically sound and inclusive strategies for restoration, while strengthening the capacities and decision-making power of local restoration actors.

To address the decline of long-fallow swidden agriculture and agroforestry in Tanzania, this project combines research and action to restore these approaches in management of coastal forest areas. Farmer-led research, institutional capacity-building, and developing business opportunities based on ecosystem services will be combined to provide new sustainable land management options for small-scale farmers.

Community-based action plans and sustainable land management interventions are co-developed to address land degradation and improve livelihoods in the Ethiopian Rift Valley. This includes land degradation assessments, locally-led participatory approaches, gender-sensitive and low-cost site-specific business models, and local capacity strengthening.

This project addresses unsustainable agriculture practices that lead to environmental degradation and biodiversity loss in Myanmar and Viet Nam. Through a research-to-action approach, stakeholders are exploring the drivers of degradation, engaging in transparent policy dialogues, and developing inclusive diversified crop enterprises and restoration practices in forest-farm landscapes.

To help address deforestation in northeast Cambodia, Indigenous communities are receiving support to strengthen their traditional natural resource management systems and inclusive governance powers. Through local action research, this project aims to enable these communities to develop their agroecology, agroforestry, and sustainable forest and wetland management systems further.

Responding to mangrove deforestation in Myanmar's Ayeyarwady Delta, this project focuses on community-led research to explore and implement ways to protect and govern mangroves better, leading to improved climate resilience and increased economic opportunities.

Forest owners and nearby communities in Viet Nam’s natural forest environments, are developing innovative and evidence-based sustainable forest management methods. This project focuses on support for community researchers in their use of bioacoustics and local leadership for enhancing livelihoods while conserving and restoring natural forests.

In the Aklan River Watershed Forest Reserve in the Philippines, conflicting development plans and unsustainable practices threaten ecological integrity. In this project, local citizen science is establishing practical approaches for watershed conservation, the promotion of inclusive governance and  community-led nature-based solutions.

Tanzania's Southern Highlands and Northern Arid regions are facing threats from unsustainable use of the land. This initiative is supporting local farmer and pastoralist organisations to lead research, employ restorative practices, and overcome implementation barriers to environmental sustainability and increased productivity.

This project is employing context specific agroforestry practices and improved value chains in the Bac Ha district of the Northern Mountains of Viet Nam. With a main focus on strengthening local capabilities for these actions, the project is also analysing practical financing options from carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services with a view to restore degraded lands, mitigate the impacts of climate change and support livelihoods.

To restore forests and enhance biodiversity in Bangladesh's Chittagong Hill Tracts, this project is expanding proven models of restoration in a mosaic of land use types at landscape level through locally-led planning, implementation and monitoring.

Communities in Zimbabwe are exploring the benefits of an innovative approach called "Farming with Alternative Pollinators" and supporting smallholder farmers to bring back greater diversity of pollinators in their farms with proven benefits for crop productivity and resilience while promoting ecosystem restoration.

Rising refugee numbers in Uganda has contributed to land and vegetation degradation, loss of livelihoods and health challenges, which exacerbate climate change impacts. In this project, refugee and host communities adopt a research-to-action approach to design, pilot and promote solutions for biodiversity conservation, enhanced food security, inclusivity, and improved livelihoods.

This project aims to empower communities in the Southern Kenya-Northern Tanzania transboundary landscape by generating with them better information on which to base actions for food-system improvement, locally relevant media communications, and inclusive dialogue platforms. These actions will focus on improved land management practices, environmental restoration and climate change resilience.