Mobilisation was achieved through economic valuation of water resources, provision of locally available information and capacity building for learning and leadership.

• The project’s Living Water Partnership established a Payment for Ecosystem Services scheme in Guatemala to protect and restore the Tacaná Watersheds’ natural resources, focussing primarily on water. 
• WANI facilitated grassroots mobilisation in Mexico through the establishment of the ‘virtual water resource libraries’ in the town halls of five municipalities. These provided access to up-to-date information and knowledge on water resources and the environment in the region. 
• Learning from the pilot projects under WANI has been incorporated into the University of San Carlos’s academic studies through 10-month internships. These programmes are creating a critical mass of professionals trained in WANI concepts, approaches and practice who will eventually go into professional positions in different institutions and organizations active in the area, creating an influential feedback loop.

The ADIO represents 110 families of the Ostional community. They are the main partners responsible for implementing the actions of habitat maintenance, collecting eggs according to plan management and conservation and packaging of eggs. Of the ADIO sales, 70% are distributed to members and 30% are reserved for local development such as construction of roads, bridges, health centers and school resources. The direct benefit that each family receives are: an endowment of eggs for consumption, an equitable distribution of family income, scholarships for students, aid to elderly and pregnant adults.

Eco-restoration through agro-forestry on forest fringes and slopes, and plantations on bunds was implemented as livelihood diversification option. Bund-plantations and agro-forestry enhance soil fertility, reduce forest fragmentation, increase soil moisture and decrease soil erosion. In addition, they ensure the provision of resources like wood and fruits, to add to the incomes of farmers in future. Tree based options are supposedly much more robust and long-lasting than crop based options for climate change adaptation, though their impacts can only be assessed in long term.

Care was taken in selecting the tree species as it was important to preserve the genetic pool of native tree species while avoiding the introduction of any alien species not conducive to the local environment. This also contributes to water conservation, as native tree species would not absorb that much water from the soil.

The analysis aimed at studying the vulnerability of tribal communities located in the upper catchments of Gaur river in Niwas block of Mandla district towards erratic rainfall. The assessment is also relevant for the entire Mahakuahsal region.

In order to understand exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity of the region, the team has taken a people-centric approach combining field work for the collection of household and village institution data with data available under public domain. The latter comprised finding and analyzing existing meteorological data, other data from government agencies and conducting interviews with higher authorities. The field methods applied include PRA, ecological baseline protocols, household economic analysis and farmer questionnaires.

The results were used to design and implement activities that specifically work on counteracting the impact of erratic rainfall, drought conditions, containing soil erosion and strengthening village institutions for building conservation ethic, in order to control the forest degradation and fragmentation. Building models to interlink farm and demonstrations on commons for reducing soil erosion.

Village level institutional mechanism is essential for the protection of indigenous community conserved areas. A key aspect of FES's interventions in the villages of Mandla was the constitution of the Natural Resource Management Committees or Prakratik Sansadhan Prabandhan Samitis (PSPS). The samitis, were elected by the Gram Sabhas (adult meetings) and had universal membership ensuring that every resident of the village, despite his/her social or economic standing had a say in the functioning of the Samiti. Advising the gram Sabha on natural resource management and spearheading the process of developing rules and regulations around commons is one of the duties of the committee along with planning for natural resources and land use.

The PSPS received training on decentralized governance, perspective building on commons and planning. Village institutions arrived at a set of rules on using natural resources. Primarily, these rules included boundary rules, protection rules for forests and usage rules to some extent. Basic focus has been on controlling lopping and logging of trees. At some places, they have also come up with rules regarding sharing of fish produced in village pond, etc. for forests and usage rules to some extent.

The actual expert elicitation assessment is carried out during a workshop or series of workshops, attended by appointed marine experts in the field of marine environmental or socio-economic sciences. The experts collaborate and discuss the status and trends on the different parameters for the marine assessment and come to a consensus score. The scores are recorded during the workshop and entered into the SOME website. Notes are taken by a rapporteur on the discussion and the details of relevant reports, papers or other documents are recorded . The interaction and discussions during the workshop should allow the editorial board to identify potential authors to participate in the subsequent report-writing phase of the process.

GRID-Arendal has created a pilot, web-based system to capture, analyse and display state of the marine environment assessment results: http://some.grida.no. The website allows for the real-time capture and display of data (scores for parameters, confidence, risks) during the workshop and provides an online template for the production of a State of Marine Environment Report. The content and graphics can be exported and used as the basis for a national or regional SOME report or the contents can be adapted for use within other formats as required. The database allows direct correlation to the outline of the World Ocean Assessment, thereby permitting cross-referencing and combining outcomes of the assessment to optimize it as a contribution to the international effort. Another key aspect is that the diagrams and outputs that are produced by the web site are designed for easy communication of the workshop results to policy- and decision-makers. The diagrams are simple, jargon-free and clearly communicate the main findings of the judgments made by the experts.

The Corridor ecosystem has been well-studied and over 200,000 geo-referenced data points are available to help establish spatial management plans. Fisher communities have participated in monitoring resources in the past and currently are generating data on their catch. This in combination with other data from the literature, and from interviews and mapping processes that fishermen participate in, help integrate a wealth of traditional knowledge and scientific information to produce realistic management proposals. Even when presented with complex analyses of this data resulting from computer models such as INVEST and ZONATION, fishers have shown confidence in the information presented to them and they validate it. By creating a decision-making process that uses evidence from these various sources that all stakeholders believe in, we are building a science-based decision making process. We plan to work with stakeholders to define the best indicators for tracking the impacts of management, and then design a participatory process for monitoring these, developing a common, science-based language for measuring the effectiveness of the program. The program is building a digital platform that will serve to communicate the advances.

This project involves fishermen and other actors in planning their future use of the coastal marine area of the Puerto Peñasco Corridor, but it also seeks meaningful engagement of stakeholders from the onset by engaging them in implementing actions to improve ecosystem management.  Many practitioners of CMSP are frustrated with the timeframe involved in moving from planning to implementation. Stakeholders get frustrated too.  This project gets stakeholders involved in activities such as cleaning beaches, monitoring resources, analyzing data, distributing materials to their communities and in supporting youth in their community. It shows them what collective action is and how it can be implemented in so many ways.  It also serves in building their capactiy for ecosystem management.

The fishing communities of the Corridor are isolated from one another and are marginalized from the regional economy. They have few opportunities to interact at that scale. Even within a community there is little social structure.  The project created a forum for interaction and collaboration for solving problems. To strengthen capacity to participate in this forum and planning process, we have focused on building fisher capacity to represent their communities in an Intercommunity Management Group. Workshops have been offered on communication, negotiation, and other leadership skills. We developed materials, held workshops and organized exchanges with other fishermen to give them a better understanding of the variety of management tools that can be applied to improve fisheries and reduce conflicts. This is key to setting the stage for informed decision-making and adopting new management instruments. For more comprehensive acceptance of the process, all community members should be informed. Through communication programs, messages on billboards, radio addresses, social media and workshops, the program involves the entire community to understand and support the process.