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Ministry, WWF-Laos kick off forest conservation project

The Department of Forestry and WWF-Laos have begun the Lao side of an ambitious project to protect the forests and wildlife of southern Laos and central Vietnam.
The project will run for six years and cost EUR 3.3 million (over 32 billion kip) for activities undertaken on the Lao side.
The scheme is titled “Avoidance of deforestation and forest degradation along the border in central Vietnam and southern Laos in Saravan and Xekong provinces (Carbon and Biodiversity, Phase 2)”, according to a press release from WWF-Laos.
A Memorandum of Understanding on the project was signed on Tuesday in Pakxe, Champassak province, by the Deputy Director General of the Department of Forestry of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Mr Sangthong Southammakod, and Country Director of WWF-Laos, Mr Somphone Bouasavanh.

The Carbon and Biodiversity Phase 2 project (CarBi 2) is a transboundary project that contributes to the protection, restoration, and sustainable use of ecosystems and the conservation of biological diversity in the Central Annamites Landscape.
Through innovative and transformational conservation interventions, the project supports the governments of Laos and Vietnam to meet their obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity.
The project area falls within the Central Annamites Landscape mountain range, covering an area of about 300,000 hectares in the provinces of Saravan and Xekong in the south of Laos as well as in three Vietnamese provinces. Being one of the biggest contiguous natural forests in continental Asia, the region is a storehouse of rich biodiversity.
In Laos, the project will help conserve biodiversity and ecosystems in and around the forest complex of the Xesap National Biodiversity Conservation Area. This will be achieved through improved natural resource management by key actors including civil society organisations and by reaching across borders to cooperate with Vietnam.
Mr Somphone said “The growing pressure from wildlife consumption, large-scale forest conversion, legal and illegal logging, poaching, overharvesting of natural resources and the impact of unsustainable infrastructure projects, threaten this world class landscape with widespread habitat and biodiversity loss.”
 “Our vision is to build a future in which humans live in harmony with nature by supporting the government of Laos to conserve forests and protect wildlife,” he added.
“By implementing this CarBi 2 project, WWF-Laos hopes to bring not just effective nature conservation to the Central Annamites Landscape, but also improved livelihoods for the people who live there.”
The key objectives of the project are to: Effectively expand and conserve the protected area network; Enhance the capacities of local actors to implement national policies and international regulations on illegal wildlife and timber trade, including CITES and Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT); Increase effective community engagement in sustainable natural resource management and protection; and Develop sustainable financing mechanisms and promote to key decision makers.
The activities will be implemented in Kaleum district, Xekong province and Samuay and Ta-Oy districts in Saravan province by the Implementation Management Committee consisting of the Department of Forestry, provincial agriculture and forestry offices in Xekong and Saravan, and WWF-Laos.
The six-year EUR 3,309,877 project is funded by the German Development Bank KfW and is part of the International Climate Initiative of Germany’s Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, established under a decision by the German Bundestag.

By Phomphong Laoin
(Latest Update November 1, 2019)


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