Kalinga Mission for Indigenous Children and Youth Development, Inc
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Empowered lives. Resilient nations. KALINGA MISSION FOR INDIGENOUS CHILDREN AND YOUTH DEVELOPMENT, INC. (KAMICYDI) Philippines Equator Initiative Case Studies Local sustainable development solutions for people, nature, and resilient communities UNDP EQUATOR INITIATIVE CASE STUDY SERIES Local and indigenous communities across the world are advancing innovative sustainable development solutions that work for people and for nature. Few publications or case studies tell the full story of how such initiatives evolve, the breadth of their impacts, or how they change over time. Fewer still have undertaken to tell these stories with community practitioners themselves guiding the narrative. To mark its 10-year anniversary, the Equator Initiative aims to fill this gap. The following case study is one in a growing series that details the work of Equator Prize winners – vetted and peer-reviewed best practices in community-based environmental conservation and sustainable livelihoods. These cases are intended to inspire the policy dialogue needed to take local success to scale, to improve the global knowledge base on local environment and development solutions, and to serve as models for replication. Case studies are best viewed and understood with reference to ‘The Power of Local Action: Lessons from 10 Years of the Equator Prize’, a compendium of lessons learned and policy guidance that draws from the case material. Click on the map to visit the Equator Initiative’s searchable case study database. Editors Editor-in-Chief: Joseph Corcoran Managing Editor: Oliver Hughes Contributing Editors: Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Erin Lewis, Whitney Wilding Contributing Writers Edayatu Abieodun Lamptey, Erin Atwell, Toni Blackman, Jonathan Clay, Joseph Corcoran, Larissa Currado, Sarah Gordon, Oliver Hughes, Wen-Juan Jiang, Sonal Kanabar, Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Rachael Lader, Patrick Lee, Erin Lewis, Jona Liebl, Mengning Ma, Mary McGraw, Gabriele Orlandi, Juliana Quaresma, Peter Schecter, Martin Sommerschuh, Whitney Wilding, Luna Wu Design Oliver Hughes, Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Amy Korngiebel, Kimberly Koserowski, Erin Lewis, John Mulqueen, Lorena de la Parra, Brandon Payne, Mariajosé Satizábal G. Acknowledgements The Equator Initiative acknowledges with gratitude KAMICYDI, and in particular the guidance and inputs of Donato Bumacas. All photo credits courtesy of KAMICYDI. Maps courtesy of CIA World Factbook and Wikipedia. Suggested Citation United Nations Development Programme. 2012. Kalinga Mission for Indigenous Children and Youth Development, Inc. (KAMICYDI), Philippines Equator Initiative Case Study Series. New York, NY. KALINGA MISSION FOR INDIGENOUS CHILDREN AND YOUTH DEVELOPMENT, INC. (KAMICYDI) Philippines PROJECT SUMMARY KEY FACTS Kalinga Mission for Indigenous Children and Youth Development, Inc. (KAMICYDI) works to improve food EQUATOR PRIZE WINNER: 2004 security for the indigenous Kalinga people of the Philippines Cordillera, while ensuring the ecological FOUNDED: 1996 integrity of the area’s mountain forests. The association draws from traditional farming practices and customary LOCATION: Kalinga Province forest management systems. BENEFICIARIES: indigenous Kalinga farmers These traditional approaches have been augmented by a robust reforestation program and by the introduction BIODIVERSITY: forest and watershed management of new food sources such as mud fish, soy and mango. Biodiversity monitoring using modern sampling techniques is conducted regularly to measure changes in forest composition and health. KAMICYDI has also played a leading role in regional indigenous peoples’ movements to resist large-scale extractive industries, including proposed geothermal projects. TABLE OF CONTENTS Background and Context 4 Key Activities and Innovations 6 Biodiversity Impacts 7 Socioeconomic Impacts 8 Policy Impacts 9 Sustainability 10 Replication 10 Partners 11 3 Background and Context Kalinga Province is situated in the Cordillera Administrative Region Cordillera region. Initially beginning in 1984, the Dananao Students of the northern Philippines island of Luzon. The Cordillera’s mountain Organisation provided outreach services to Kalinga’s indigenous valleys are home to the indigenous Kalinga people, whose main communities. Ancestral domain and environmental protection livelihood activity is farming on hillside rice terraces. This activity were the main focuses of these efforts. From 1987, this work was relies heavily on the conservation of mountain forest biodiversity replicated in other areas of the Cordillera Administrative Region and the health of local watersheds, including the Chico River system. by the Cordillera Association for Progress and Unity; in 1990, this led to the formation of the Kalinga Mission for Children and Youth A people and way of life under threat Development, Inc. (KMCYD, Inc.), an organisation that would be legally registered in 1996, and renamed the Kalinga Mission for In response to various threats to the province’s natural heritage Indigenous Communities and Youth Development, Inc. (KAMICYDI) and persistently low levels of social development during the in 2003. 1980s, a group of student leaders came together to found the Dananao Students Organization (DSO), a group that would lay the foundations for the formation of the Kalinga Mission for Indigenous Communities and Youth Development, Inc. (KAMICYDI) in the 1990s. These students and young people aimed to confront the widespread poverty of the Kalinga people, the loss of their traditional culture, the effects of armed conflict, poor delivery of social services, and their marginalisation within the Philippines development sphere. The Kalinga peoples’ valleys were also threatened by infrastructure projects proposed by the Philippines government which endangered their communities, sacred places, rice terraces, livelihoods, and natural heritage. The Chico River Dam Project was a notable case, in which an electric power generation project threatened the Kalinga peoples’ ancestral domain. The Batong Buhay Gold Mines, under the control of the Philippines government from 1979, also had significant harmful environmental impacts. Local slash-and-burn agricultural practices had further contributed to the loss of forest cover and watershed degradation. A youth-led response to environmental threats KAMICYDI’s response to these threats was to combine traditional and indigenous practices with modern technologies to develop more sustainable agricultural practices, which were then promoted among the Kalinga tribes and other indigenous peoples in the 4 From 1990 onwards, KAMICYDI’s young leaders began pioneering historically inhabited and defended by a homogeneous people with their innovative approach, called “Sustainable Indigenous Peoples common ancestors. KAMICYDI’s interaction with specific Kalinga Agricultural Technology” (or SIPAT). Project activities were focussed communities has taken place within the context of the ili; to date, on enhancing the ecological integrity of forests, directly protecting the initiative has worked with 54 such communities, or a total of forests, and reforestation with endemic species; protecting 174,000 Kalinga people. Thanks to this work, the poverty rate in watersheds through agroforestry; the rehabilitation of indigenous these communities has fallen from 72% in 1996 to 54% in 2009. communal irrigation systems; and the production of rice, vegetables, The Kalinga have also been able to conserve 90% of their forest and fish in hillside rice terraces. The primary objectives were to biodiversity during this time. improve food security by increasing agricultural productivity, and helping to conserve the mountains’ biological diversity. The SIPAT approach draws heavily on pre-existing technologies and traditional farming approaches. For instance, KAMICYDI has Preserving indigenous and traditional heritage popularised fitu, a traditional system of hunting that has helped to conserve forest cover. Watersheds have been protected through an These twin goals have been pursued alongside efforts to preserve approach known as pinagwa, while ara is an indigenous irrigation Kalinga traditions and culture, particularly linked to their ancestral system used for rice terraces. Decisions have been taken in a domain lands. While the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (1997) of the participatory manner, including communities in the management of Philippines recognizes “ancestral domains” of indigenous cultural agricultural systems, in an indigenous governance system known as communities, this has typically concerned spatial definitions such amung. as the barangay, which is the smallest politico-administrative unit of the Philippines, or has been applied to municipalities. The Kalinga Finally, KAMICYDI’s approach has also relied on multi-stakeholder communities of Cordillera Province typically live within an area of partnerships to enable its large-scale education and policy advocacy land known as an ili, a term in the Philippines for a geographical area campaigns. 5 Key Activities and Innovations The sustainable agricultural techniques advocated by KAMICYDI consist of five main components. The first of these is fitu forest management. According to indigenous practices, when holes are dug in forested areas to trap animals such as wild boars for meat, it is prohibited to cut any tree within a 20-metre radius of the hole. This helps to conserve forest resources, while simultaneously ensuring the sustainability of meat supplies. Other activities incorporated