Appendix A4 Mid-term Evaluation Report (February 2003) Introduction

3.2 The Nature Reserves

The project has been active in eleven nature reserves within the selected wetland sites. Farming, fish-farming, reed-harvesting, drainage, hunting, fishing, harvesting of plants, overgrazing, damage by alien invasive species and pollution occur inside the nature reserves. The Nature Reserve managements do not have legal land tenure rights over large parts of the nature reserves under their nominal control, and this hampers any coherent attempts to manage their reserves.

3.3 Underlying causes

The direct threats listed above have their roots in the constraints under which the managers and decision makers are working. The underlyingcauses can be listed as follows:

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  Population pressure leading to destruction of habitat
  
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  Lack of information and inadequate monitoring
  
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  Poor understanding or (or poor acceptance and application of) basic ecological principles and their relationship to management of wetlands
  
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  Lack of information
  
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  Poor enforcement of environmental laws and regulations, leading to widespread abuse of the legislation
  
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  Inappropriate policies of central and provincial governments on management of wetlands. [Lack of funds for law enforcement and nature reserve management operations is also generated from inappropriate policies.]
  
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  Inadequate institutional and intersectoral coordination for policy development and implementation, including conflicting objectives and policy between sectors, overlapping jurisdiction and legal uncertainty
  
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  Poor public information and environmental education on wetland conservation, and insufficient incorporation of such activities into tourism for example
  
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  Flaws in the protected area system (categories, zonation, funding and management culture)
  
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  Rates of return on funds invested in biodiversity and ecological services of wetlands not widely understood or taken into account. Low priority given to biodiversity conservation by government
  

4. Responses to the problems, and Strategies for implementation

Some of the root causes can be addressed by this project: others have to be addressed in different ways. But it is clear that this project will not progress towards its objectives unless ittackles underlying causes and not just the site level manifestations of those underlying problems.

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  capacity building of managers and relevant decision makers at all levels from nature reserves to county governments up to the state levels so that they gain a better understanding of ecological principles and the importance of wetlands and biodiversity to the people and the economy.
  
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  sound research and monitoring programmes to measure trends and provide information for use in decision making and in assessing the effectiveness of management interventions
  
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  mitigation of the most severe deleterious impacts of human use on wetland restoration through targeted interventions to modify certain practices or the effects of certain practices (such as proposed in the most recent protected area management plans)
  
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  working through existing planning mechanisms to establish patterns of consultation and communication and to involve scientists in wetland management where appropriate and take into account their research findings
  
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  review of law and policy related to wetlands and nature reserves at the state level, particularly where current policies contribute to the threats facing nature reserves
  
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  sound, ecologically based, public awareness and environmental education programmes taking into account social factors
  
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  including the people most closely affected by the environmental problems in designing solutions
  

The strategies to be used to carry out the required responses under the redesigned project differ from the original project design in the following characteristics:

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  Improved coordination through a more comprehensive and coherent approach to management at each site and elimination of specialized sub-contracts that address one component of the project at each of the four project sites.
  
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  Decentralization of project management so that provincial project management units become accountable for achievement of objectives and outputs, and site specific approaches are developed through local planning workshops the organization of which is delegated to the local units.
  
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  Emphasis on ensuring that the project management units at the various levels have a clear and common understanding of the threats facing wetland biodiversity and the institutional and other constraints facing attempts to combat those threats.
  
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  Stress on “learning by doing” rather than experts doing the work
  
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  Limiting the role of "Wetland Management Authorities" to project leading groups and using existing planning processes to influence decision making on wetlands rather than setting up new institutions
  
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  Proper coordination of the government co-financing with GEF financing and use of project budgets and workplans that combine funds and activities from the the two sources
  
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  Strong links and joint work with government programmes so that training and general capacity strengthening applied to units that will be managing wetlands and nature reserves after the project ends
  
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  Use of long term volunteers (rather than short term consultants) in the field when it is necessary to gain good understanding of the local conditions prior to project interventions
  
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  Dynamic links between project activities
  
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  Cooperation and exchange of ideas with Chinese and international conservation organizations