Forum Offers Seed Grants To Transform Degraded Landscapes In West Africa

Posted by Eric Ojo African News, Business News, Featured, Latest Headlines, News Across Nigeria, News Around Africa Sunday, November 7th, 2021

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) with the support of the Robert Bosch Foundation is deploying €25,000 grant for local landscape restoration and conservation projects in the Sahel region of West Africa.

The project which are located in Bawku (Ghana), Ibadan (Nigeria), Nkambe and Yaoundé (Cameroon), and Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), are part of GLF’s African Sahel Chapter Network.

GLF is the world’s largest knowledge-led platform on integrated land use, dedicated to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and Paris Climate Agreement. The Forum takes a holistic approach to create sustainable landscapes that are productive, prosperous, equitable and resilient, and considers five cohesive themes of food and livelihoods, landscape restoration, rights, finance and measuring progress.

The Forum is led by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), in collaboration with its co-founders United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Bank and Charter members.

After eight years of building a robust knowledge-based digital platform on integrated land use, GLF is now taking an important step forward to strengthen the Restoration Alliance’s actions.

In Yaoundé, Cameroon, a group of organizations led by Support Humanity Cameroon (SUHUCAM) are challenging the trend of deforestation in the region, with impressive results. Since 2019, with the help of more than 250 volunteers including farmers, grazers, restoration practitioners and community leaders, they have planted over 7,000 trees and restored 50 hectares of degraded land: the equivalent of over 90 football fields.

In addition, other GLF Chapters and forest stewards are working to promote the socioeconomic transformation of their communities – by planting trees, rescuing endangered species, collecting seeds, training students and young people, and/or connecting and inspiring stakeholders to act together for a healthier landscape

Stories like this, about the positive effects of people acting to restore the landscapes where they live, are common in the Restoration Alliance community. Hosted by GLF, the Restoration Alliance gathers restoration stewards and GLF Chapters across the world with a mission to drive local, sustainable landscape-restoration action.

Interestingly, three sessions devoted this development has been scheduled to hold from November 5 to 7 at a conference with the themes, “GLF Climate: Forests, Food, Finance –Frontiers of Changes”, alongside the ongoing COP 26. The sessions are holding at the University of Glasgow and interested participants can join online.

Speakers will share about the challenges of restoration activities, the impacts for communities, and how they plan to scale up the initiatives in line with global efforts during the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.

Eminent personalities and speakers at the sessions include, His Majesty Inkosi ya Makosi Gomani, King of the Maseki Ngoni in Malawi, Ottilie Bälz, Senior Vice President, Robert Bosch Foundation, Sunday Geofrey Mbafoambe, Coordinator of GLF Yaoundé Chapter and SUHUCAM, Mukhwana Laura Vanessa, Coordinator of GLF Nairobi Chapter and Emem Umoh, Coordinator of GLF Uyo Chapter; founder and CEO of Women in Nature Conservation Organization (WINCO).