District level workshop on “Development of road-map for ecosystem services certification in Nepal”

Thursday, 26 December 2019: ANSAB and NEPCon aim to establish a new partnership leveraging on the long-term expertise working with sustainable forest management and ecosystem services certification, combined with local expertise and excessive experience of working with forest dependent communities in Nepal. ANSAB and NEPCon, with funding support from CISU – Civil Society in Development, have been implementing a project “Strengthening forest dependent communities in Nepal through capacity building around sustainable forest management and forest certification”. The project activities have been carried out in 25 community forests -17 in Gaurishankar Conservation Area of Dolakha district and 8 in Nawalpur district of Nepal, to identify major forest based ecosystem services, and assess the knowledge, interests and capacity building needs of the forest user groups, that would be helpful for designing the larger program to increase financial and social empowerment of poor forest dependent communities in Nepal.

As a part of the project, ANSAB organized a district level workshop in Dolakha district on November 18 and 19, 2019 with the overall objective to develop a practical idea for the new project that would support to build resilient communities and sustainable ecosystems through conservation and maintenance of ecosystem services. The specific objectives of the workshop were to:

  • Share the concept of the ecosystem services and its new approach;
  • Update the stakeholders on the findings of community level trainings;
  • Prioritize the ecosystem services and potential activities that can be helpful in order to develop a roadmap for ecosystem service certification.

There were total of 43 participants including chairperson of Dolakha District Coordination Committee, Gaurishankar Rural Municipality, Jiri Municipality, Divisional Forest Office, Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, Gaurishankar Conservation Area program, District Chamber of Commerce and Industries (DCCI), district chapter of FECOFUN, representatives from participating community forest user groups (CFUGs), and drinking water supply and sanitation management committee.