Establishment of the Lushan World Heritage Monitoring and Early Warning System (LMES)
Multiple supportive actors
EGI has engaged multiple and diverse actors, to support different and important aspects of the overall strategy. First, the local authorities were key as they provided access to the Protected Area to the EGI team, in times of lockdown and restricted access to transport and places. Second, the local and national medias supported the different activities, by organising talk show to share information and support education and awareness raising efforts. EGI was offered 16 opportunities, to create awareness on the relevance of promoting conservation amidst Covid-19 times in the country. Finally, the Telecom company contributed to solving human – wildlife conflicts, establishing an environmental toll-free line, allowing communities to call EGI and the park rangers, if elephants for example come out of the park, with the risk of damaging their fields. The phone call allows for a quick response, where park rangers bring the elephants back in the Protected Area, avoiding the killing of these animals.
EGI experienced a significant increase in its visibility and the work it does, at the local and international levels, since it was granted with the IUCN Save Our Species rapid grant and listed on the website. EGI received for example, 18 interview requests from international members who wanted to understand the work, how we do and the impact Covid 19 has had on conservation as well as our response to them. This gave the organization international recognition as the information was accredited to us.
Partnerships are key with both governement and local communities in response to an emergency situation in conservation.
EGI partnered with Bunyoro and Bugungu cultural institutions to provide art skills to local people. 20 community groups, including women, youth and girls, formed different drama groups, that perform theatre plays, songs and dances, delivering strong messages, while providing entertainment for local communities. They are so successful that they are now hired at different occasions to perform, which provides also an income to these drama groups. They continued to perform during the second wave of Covid-19, in radio drama programs.
The partnership with the cultural institutions allowed to develop the cultural approach and adequate messages to support behaviour change among local communities.
Cultural and religious leaders have great influence on their communities, involving them early in the project design increased the effectiveness of the approache.
Cultural values and customs must be embedded in the project as communities have an aesthetic attachment to it.
EGI conducted a rapid assessment on diversified livelihoods to find out what were local communities already doing.
Bee keeping came out as a common income generating activity, driven by a high demand in honey products. The households’ income has increased through the sale of honey and derived products, such as medicine, bee venom, propolis, wine, cosmetics. This is now cushioning them against climate change impact such as prolonged droughts and floods that have negative impacts on agriculture, hence able to sustain income and their livelihoods which is thus addressing the key drivers of poaching.
Another sector of intervention was agriculture. Local communities were trained to improve the resistance of their crops to climate change.
Community champions took a leadership role in exchanging with their larger community. They also co-drafted their bylaws with EGI, during community meetings, that mandate people not to trade in any act of poaching, trade-in species or products, illegal entry into the Protected Area. These were the first local regulations ever in the area.
Identifying and using community champions model is an effective tool and method for engaging communities to diversify their livelihoods, increase acceptability of the project and attract communities to embrace conservation efforts. This enables rapid adoption of the alternatives livelihoods options.
Partnerships with the key stakeholders including UWA and district environment and forest officers is very critical for EGI to continue engaging with the communities during the COVID 19 crisis.
Managing wildlife conflicts and threats like poaching require more community involvement and participation in planning, implementation and designing the end goal, it increases ownership and sharpens effective strategies.
Conducting community needs assessment to determine the approaches that work with different communities is key to applying tailor made interventions.
Responding to a conservation crisis requires careful understanding of community needs and using them to model immediate and long term interventions that increase the attachment communities have on wildlife.
