The Crowder-Messersmith Conservation Fund helps small, local conservation and/or education projects in developing countries. Its grants provide seed money to communities and individuals whose projects have not attracted major support from other sources. The Fund honors Orville Crowder and Don Messersmith, two leaders in nature tourism, as a means to further global nature conservation.
The Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF) provides grants to nongovernmental and private sector organizations to help protect biodiversity hotspots, Earth's most biologically rich yet threatened areas. Grant recipients range from small farming cooperatives and community associations to international organizations. Every grant helps implement an investment strategy found in the ecosystem profile for each region where we invest.
Proposals that target direct global environmental benefits and meet the following eligibility criteria are welcome:
Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH) was established in 2003 after a fatal scabies skin disease outbreak in critically endangered mountain gorillas in Uganda was traced back to rural communities who have inadequate healthcare. In 2007, CTPH started an integrated Population, Health and Environment (PHE) program to promote biodiversity conservation at Bwindi Impenetrable National Park (BINP).
The conservation strategy for the Great Lakes Region (GLR) aims to:
The Conservation Leadership Programme provides conservation awards on an annual basis to support the work of early career conservationists. There are three grant levels to allow teams to scale up their initial projects: Starting with a Future Conservationist Award, teams are supported to undertake small-scale research and awareness-raising projects.
The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) was specially formulated to stimulate the necessary reforms in the agriculture sector and bring agriculture toward the support of socio-economic growth and sustainable development. CAADP is Africa 's policy framework for agriculture and agriculture-led development. It is an integral part of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD).
CoBRA is a participatory assessment methodology, largely qualitative, which identifies the locally-specific factors contributing to the resilience of households and communities facing different types of shocks and stresses. CoBRA aims to understand resilience from community and household perspectives. This tool does not use any preconceived components of resilience, but rather helps local populations describe and explain them on their own, based on their past experience, by:
In response to achieving the Millennium Development Goals, the Community Water Initiative (CWI) was launched by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in 2004 in seven countries (Ghana, Guatemala, Kenya, Mauritania, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, and Uganda), and was recently expanded to three new countries (Mali, Niger and Senegal).
Commitments to deliver climate finance to developing countries are longstanding. Developed countries pledged to deliver finance approaching $30 billion between 2010 and 2012, in the context of a commitment to mobilise $100 billion per year from public and private sources by 2020 in the Copenhagen Accord of 2009. These commitments were affirmed in the Cancun Agreements of 2010.
The African Great Lakes region has been experiencing extreme rainfall. Sometimes, it might result in floods or it might be very dry weather. But by 2050 the whole region will be experiencing significant changes in the water cycle. Water is the lifeblood of this region with large lakes and rivers. The state of water resources affects all natural, social and economic systems. Water serves as the fundamental link between the climate system, human society and the environment. Climate change is severely impacting the hydrological cycle and consequently, water management in the region.
BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working to conserve birds, their habitats, and global biodiversity by working with people toward the sustainable use of natural resources. The BirdLife Africa Partnership is a growing network of organizations with more than 500 staff and 87,000 members.
The Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) is a specialized technical office of the Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture (DREA) of the African Union Commission (AUC). AU-IBAR 's mandate is to support and coordinate the utilization of livestock, fisheries and wildlife as resources for both human wellbeing and economic development in the Member States of the African Union (AU). Despite sustained efforts and commitment over many decades by AU-IBAR and others, the potential of animal resources in the fight against poverty and the development of Africa is still underutilized.
Increasing demand for animal-source foods, the diminishing agricultural land in relation to the growing human population and the impact of climatic variability are together placing increased pressure on the natural resource base on which agricultural production depends.
ARCOS is the only regional conservation organization solely focused on biodiversity conservation in the Albertine Rift. Its overall goal is to enhance the conservation of critical ecosystems and promote sustainable development in the Albertine Rift through collaborative actions between various regional partners.
The African Union Commission launched the prestigious African Union Scientific Award Programme in 2008 with the support of its Development Partners. Under this programme prizes are awarded to top African scientists in (a) Life and Earth Science and (b) Basic Science, Technology and Innovation. The objective is to recognize, award and honor outstanding excelling African Scientists for their scientific achievements, discoveries and innovations.
There has been renewed interest by development practitioners in Africa in the role of population dynamics in development. This is partly a result of studies conducted to examine the potential of the demographic dividend to accelerate socio-economic development in individual countries and in the continent in general in light of their large youthful population.
Adaptive management is an ongoing natural resources management process of planning, doing, assessing, learning and adapting, while also applying what was learned to the next iteration of the natural resources management process. Adaptive management facilitates developing and refining a conservation strategy, making efficient management decisions and using research and monitoring to assess accomplishments and inform future iterations of the conservation strategy.
Lake Victoria is the world's largest tropical lake and the largest lake in the African Great Lakes region. The lake supports the largest freshwater fishery in the world, producing 1 million tons of fish per year and employing 200,000 people in supporting the livelihoods of 4 million people. The major threats to the lake are deforestation, land use change, wetland degradation and discharge from urban areas, industries and farmlands.
Lake Turkana is shallow, but it is the world's largest permanent desert and alkaline lake in the world. The lake water comes from river inflows and all water loss in the lake comes from evaporation. The lake's basin is sparsely populated and residents of the lake lack access to potable water, causing high rates of disease prevalence in the basin. These conditions are compounded by low literacy levels and extremely high poverty levels.
Lake Edward is the smallest among the African Great Lakes, but its basin includes the highly productive Lake George. The majority of the population along the lake lack clean water and have poor sanitation. The basin is home to 81 fish species and the lake's productive fisheries employ around 2000 fishers. Two National Parks, Virunga NP and Queen Elizabeth NP) border the lake, making this area a valuable tourism stop.