A multidisciplinary national FLR committee was set up as an advisory board, facilitating intersectoral & interministerial coordination to moving from the FLR pledge to concrete policies and action. It consists of 15 persons including the ministries of environment, agriculture, energy and water, spatial planning and representatives from civil society and the private sector.

It covers five working groups dealing with i) forest management, ii) water, iii) agriculture, vi) financing and v) soil management. It validates all key decisions. Members also participate, as resource persons, in technical capacity building activities.

The committee conducted a stakeholder and capacity needs assessment, funding analysis and facilitated various multi-stakeholder dialogues e.g. for the development of the national forest landscape restoration strategy and ensures that the interests of involved stakeholders are considered.

The FLR platform is a multi-stakeholder dialogue forum with more than 50 members, led by the FLR committee, to discuss, propose and validate practical solutions for forest landscape restoration at regional and local level and support the implementation of the FLR strategy and capacity development.

Before beginning to approach potential funders it was necessarily to carefully plan and design the project and anticipate all the information that funders would wish to know. This includes the project aims and outputs, the team involved, the logistical plan and the budget. It is also important to clearly think about how the project will have a lasting legacy beyond the clean-up expedition. This should be developed into a full written project proposal.

Following completion of the project design it is necessary to set-up project media sites, this also required developing a project logo, title and tag line. We also set-up specific project email addresses. The media sites (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & project website) all required initial content and therefore a photo library was compiled and content text established. Before launching the project we also completed team recruitment (12 team volunteers in total) and allocated specific team roles for the duration of the project, for example, social media officer, outreach officer, science officer. With this now in place it was possible to plan a fundraising strategy.

Developed attitude and behavior assessment surveys targeting specific groups (e.g., visitors, local communities, and productive sectors) who visit or reside near MPAs carried out at different times. A web-based “Friends of the SMPA Society” comprised of national and international scientists and members of civil society were put in place. The project developed an information dissemination and communication strategy specific in marine topics, which will inform the general population about MPAs through print, audiovisual (radio, TV, newspapers, and internet), as well as dissemination meetings. The main activities were: a)Dissemination campaigns; b)implementation of the SAMP web page; c)awareness campaigns in educational centers (schools and universities); and d) establishment of a data base of images and videos bilingual (Spanish and English). SAMP promoted in international and national events of scientific nature, such as seminars, congresses, side-event in COP of Biodiversity, among others. Main results: 11% increase over the baseline of behavior and attitudes test scores; 5 new funding proposals leveraged by the “Friends of the SMPA Society"; national recognition at the end of the GEF-Project promoted a participatory roadmap for sustainability of next 5 years reacheness.

The institutional and individual capacity for the management of the MPAs in the SAMP were improved: a) developed or strengthen training programs for MPA management (e.g., regulatory framework, management plans, financial
sustainability, and monitoring and conservation); b) developed of planning and resource use agreements; c) supported the consolidation of the MPA management plans; d) monitoring and use of GIS tools to aid MPA management decision-making was developed; and e) assessment of the MPA management effectiveness using the METT tool was runned. Additionally, the project contributed to enhance the institutional
capacity of INVEMAR and to improved MPA management by providing funds to update monitoring/research and GIS laboratories in new headquarters in Santa Marta. The main outputs: A monitoring system for the SMPA articulated with SINAP’; Agreements for planning and resource use developed for six (6) pilot MPAs specifying roles, financial obligations, and conflict-resolution mechanisms; Selected staff from MPAs and decision-makers trained in MPA management, financial planning, and monitoring and evaluation; Existing ecology programs in higher educational institutions include MPA; Decision Support System based-GIS tools. 

The sustainable financial management plans are oriented to meet the needs of the Subsystem through the identification of activities  run by the local communities which can raise revenues. Such activities include eco-tourism (scientific tourism, birdwatching, marine mammal watching), sport fishing, scenic diving and sustainable use of biodiversity resources. These plans are entailed towards the conservation of the ecosystem goods and services while giving economical opportunites to local communities and environmental entities. A financial framework ensuring the sustainability of the SAMP consolidated through the strengthening of current sources of financing and the inclusion of new ones. The framework includes the development of provisions and mechanisms to increase the current government and non-government contributions to the MPAs. Agreements to override MPA management cost with the direct beneficiaries of conservation was defined. To assess the potentiality of payments for avoided deforestation in mangroves as a financing option for MPAs and SAMP, a pilot project for the reduction of emissions caused by deforestation-degradation of mangroves was formulated and executed in Cispata. Now under replication and apply for "bluecarbon market".