The Albertine Rift Forest Biodiversity Conservation project takes off
Representatives from the 5 Districts attending a workshop at Kijungu Hill Hotel
On the 14th and 15th August 2008 representatives from the 5 Districts of Hoima, Masindi, Kibale, Kyenjojo and Buliisa met at Kijungu Hotel, Hoima to receive updates on the status of the upcoming Albertine Rift Forest Conservation Project from UNDP, a project whose preparation began as far as 1998.
The workshop was attended by a broad spectrum of stakeholders that included district political leaders and technical and administrative staff from the five districts and representatives of central government departments and civil society organizations. Over thirty five participants attended the workshop that was opened and closed by the Chairperson of Hoima District Local Government in the presence of the Chief Administrative Officer. During the workshop, the roles of UNDP in project management and oversight were outlined by the Environment Specialist, Justin Ecaat.
As a follow up to this stakeholders consultative workshop, an inception workshop was held on 25th September 2008 at Kijungu Hill Hotel, Hoima and also drew participants from the 5 Districts. The project inception workshop was also attended by the UNDP Assistant Resident Representative in-charge of the Poverty Reduction Programme (Wilson Kwamya), the Director, Environmental Affairs in the Ministry of Water and Environment, and the WWF Country Coordinator. The inception process and stakeholder consultations were intended, among other things, to achieve the following:
Re-examine the Project and its relevance, and whether the original outputs are the still relevant?
Whether the original partners are still available to implement tier planned activities, and whether the original institutional arrangements are still viable,
To re-examine project targets, outputs and indicators,
Rebuild partner and stakeholder confidence
At the end of the consultative process, stakeholders appreciated that the project was even more relevant now considering that a lot of forest encroachment had taken place since project formulation. The participants made a number of recommendations for follow up that included, the following, among others:
Need to refine the project document to harmonize project design with current conservation and development realities and challenges in the Albertine Rift region.
Identify and map areas with most issues pertinent to project rationale and objectives and where project activities will be implemented,
Need to focus the project on promoting sustainable management and conservation of forests on private and communal lands, in addition to the Central Forest Reserves that were perceived to be receiving due attention from NFA. Also, project implementation should take into account implications of institutional changes that have occurred since project design to-date e.g. transformation of they Forest Department into the National Forest Authority and the shedding of broader functions to the District Forest Services.
Need for the project to work with local forest owners to attain levels of sustainable forest management especially within the corridors that connect the protected forests but which have been encroached and cleared for other activities such as crop farming.
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