A Cross-Sector Approach to Accelerate Restoration of Malawi's Miombo And
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Transforming landscapes and livelihoods: A cross-sector approach to accelerate restoration of Malawi’s Miombo and Mopane woodlands for sustainable forest and biodiversity management. 1 FAO-GEF PROJECT DOCUMENT Project Title: Transforming landscapes and livelihoods: A cross-sector approach to accelerate restoration of Malawi’s Miombo and Mopane woodlands for sustainable forest and biodiversity management. GEF ID: 10254 FAO Entity Number: 659021 FAO Project Symbol: GCP/MLW/078/GFF Country: Malawi EOD (Implementation start): 1.May. 2021 NTE (Implementation end): 30.April.2026 Environmental and Social low risk moderate risk x high risk Risk Classification: Gender Marker1: G0 G1 G2a G2b Contribution to FAO’s Strategic Objective/Organizational Outcome: Strategic Framework: Country Outcome(s): 2 &3 Malawi has a more productive, sustainable (Indicate as appropriate) and diversified agriculture, value chains and market access Outcome 4: Households have increased food and nutrition security, equitable access to WASH and health ecosystems and resilience livelihoods Country Programming Framework(s) Output(s): 2.3 Strengthened inclusive value chains (livestock, fisheries and aquaculture, forestry and crops 2.6 Access to good quality seeds enhanced 3.2 Sustainable management use of environment and natural resources 4.1 Climate change adaptation and mitigation enhanced Project Budget (GEF): $ 6,350,459 Co-financing: $ 42,429,324 Total Project Budget: $ 48,779,783 Executive Summary This project is part of the Sustainable Forest Management Impact Program on Dryland Sustainable Landscapes (the Global DSL IP), approved by the GEF in 2019 with the goal to avoid, reduce, and reverse further degradation, desertification, and deforestation of land and ecosystems in drylands through the sustainable – and integrated – management of production landscapes. Among the DSL IP countries, seven are part of the so-called ‘Miombo Cluster’: Angola, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania. Malawi lies entirely within the Zambezian region, and its vegetation is characterized by miombo and mopane woodlands, which have an estimated diversity of 6,000 flowering plants and play a key role in supporting livelihoods and protecting ecosystem services. In Malawi, non-timber forest products such as fruits, medicinal products, mushrooms, honey, caterpillars, flying termites and bush meat are central to the livelihoods of both rural and urban dwellers. Wood fuels dominate the energy sector, used by 98% of the population. Forests and woodlands also play a key role in protecting watersheds from erosion, sustain the biodiversity that underpins a large proportion of the country’s tourism sector, and make an important contribution to mitigating carbon emissions by sequestering carbon. Like elsewhere in the region, the miombo woodlands of Malawi are under severe pressure resulting in serious negative effects for the rural poor depending on them directly and indirectly. The main drivers of degradation are conversion to agriculture, timber extraction, fire and land clearing for biofuels. An estimate of climate change-related risks under the 2 ºC warming scenario in globally significant biodiversity conservation areas highlights the Miombo & Mopane ecoregion as one of the most exposed to temperature changes, and a greater reduction in wet day frequency and seasonal precipitation. The project will focus on the dry miombo and mopane ecosystems of the upper Shire Basin, and more in concrete in three target landscapes in the Districts of Mangochi, Ntcheu and Balaka, which were selected at 1 See Guidance Note on Gender Mainstreaming in project identification and formulation 2 the design phase based on biodiversity, land degradation and climate change vulnerability criteria. These landscapes have a total population of 376,910 people, from which only approx. 71,000 are classified as urban. The project seeks the transformation to sustainable management of the Miombo and Mopane woodlands in the target landscapes in line with LDN principles. The Development Objective of the project is “Improve livelihoods and economic diversification of rural communities in two productive landscapes of the Upper Shire River Basin of Southern Malawi by promoting best land management practices and green value chains for key agriculture and woodland commodities”. The Project Objective is “Sustainable management of the Miombo and Mopane productive landscapes of the Districts of Balaka, Ntcheu and Mangochi, contributing to national land degradation neutrality targets”. To achieve this objective, the project is structured into three interlinked technical components: Component 1 - Effective governance support on LDN at the national level and in the targeted Mopane/Miombo landscapes will enhance the enabling environment for LDN through strengthening the governance for sustainable management of the Miombo/Mopane woodlands in the target landscapes, creating a more conducive policy and regulatory environment, with enhanced cross-sectoral and multi-level coordination and cross-compliance and policy and regulation/bylaw formulation and implementation, as well as supportive financial instruments at both national and sub-national levels. Component 2 - Scaling out SLM and SFM best practices at the landscape level to support the development of environmentally sound, socially beneficial and economically viable green value chains will put in place gender-sensitive integrated landscape-level management systems, plans, tools/technologies and practices for climate adaptive FLR/SLM/SFM activities, and will support for the development and adoption of innovative, economically viable climate-smart Green Value Chains (GVCs) for SLM/SFM derived products. Component 3 - effective knowledge management, monitoring, and linkages with the SFM-DSL-IP will create a supportive environment for LDN monitoring at national and landscape levels under the National FLR Monitoring Framework, and will promote national, regional and global efforts to improve knowledge management systems and the sharing of knowhow on effective LDN practices across the six Miombo/Mopane countries. The Department of Forestry will act as the lead executing agency and will be responsible for the day-to-day management of project results entrusted to it in full compliance with all terms and conditions of the Operational Partnership Agreement (OPA) signed with FAO. A Project Management Unit will be established within the Department of Forestry Head Quarters in Lilongwe and supporting teams will be established in each target District. At the national level, the Malawian non-profit organisation Centre for Environmental Policy and Advocacy (CEPA) and the World Resource Institute (WRI) will provide support and guidance in the areas of policy, knowledge management, and monitoring and evaluation. At the District level, Landscape Management Committees including governmental and non-governmental actors will coordinate the design, implementation and monitoring the Integrated Landscape Management Plans that will inform all field actions. The PMU will liaise with the Global Child Project to ensure the bi-directional flow of information and knowledge between the child project in Malawi and the GCP and other SFM-DSL IP countries. The project will address the Covid19 crisis in a multiple way, mainstreaming Covid19 issues into the project interventions and responding to the recommendations of the UN Framework for the Immediate Socio- economic Response to Covid19. 3 Contents PART I: PROJECT INFORMATION .................................................................................. 9 A. Focal/Non-Focal Area Elements................................................................................................................... 9 B. Project description summary ....................................................................................................................... 9 C. Confirmed sources of Co-financing ........................................................................................................... 15 D. Trust Fund Resources Requested by Agency(ies), Country(ies), Focal Area and the Programming of Funds ................................................................................................................................................................. 16 E. Does the project include a “non-grant” instrument? ........................................................................... 16 F. Project’s Target Contributions to GEF 7 Core Indicators...................................................................... 16 PART II: PROJECT JUSTIFICATION ............................................................................. 18 1.a Project Description......................................................................................................................................... 18 1.b Project Map and Geo-Coordinates............................................................................................................. 100 2. Stakeholders.................................................................................................................................................... 100 3. Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment. ......................................................................................... 111 4. Private Sector Engagement. .......................................................................................................................... 118 5. Risks. ..............................................................................................................................................................