Project Document The gef small Grants Programme Fourth Operational Phase (gef-4) July 2007 – June 2010 The gef small Grants Programme Fourth Operational Phase (gef-4) Table of Contents

PART 2. STRATEGY

54. 
    During OP4, GEF SGP will secure global environmental benefits and maintain the established networks of GEF SGP Country Programmes and projects, continue to share good practices at the global level, and build capacity at the grassroots level. Annex 4 shows in detail the strategic outcomes, outputs, activities, and indicators including geographic focus areas for implementing the strategy. Annex 5 includes a work plan to complete the activities during OP4. The list of outcomes, outputs and activities does not exclude initiatives outside the list. SGP is a country-driven programme that allows adaptation and flexibility in the implementation of the programme strategy, hence countries which are not listed under certain focal areas may continue their activities supporting the strategy of the focal area, in accordance to the relevant global environment conventions and country priorities. Certain resources will be made available for innovation and areas outside of a focused theme or region. SGP, as a GEF global corporate programme, will also take note of programmatic approaches of the GEF, such as that being developed for the Pacific SIDS where it could add value and provide support through its established country driven mechanisms. The process could be through consultation with SGP country programmes involved, IAs/EAs as well as through the GEF SGP Steering Committee.
    

55. 
    Higher level outcomes mentioned in the OP4 strategy, such as influencing policy reform, will be targeted predominantly through the programme’s more “mature” countries where the growth of a critical mass of synergistic projects, networks of NGOs, producer organizations and other partners sharing good practice models is in progress.
    

56. 
    Global environmental benefits will also be secured from all GEF SGP countries, including in LDCs and SIDS, through the consolidation of a global network of country-based knowledge and practices, and the extension of a constituency of NGOs, CBOs, and CSOs with the capacity and motivation to effectively support GEF priorities. OP4 will oversee the institutionalization of multi-stakeholder NSCs to enhance positive partnerships between civil society and government for sustainability of country-based efforts and policy reform through mainstreaming into long term sustainable development goals.
    

57. 
    Global indicators for the demonstration of global benefits will include policy reform, conservation of critical ecosystems, and replication of successful good practice models. Strategic results from GEF SGP-funded Country Programmes and projects will be monitored by progress on country programme sustainability (with a priority on “mature” programmes), resource mobilization, capacity development, knowledge management.
    

58. 
    OP4 country programmes strategies will be constructed based on a minimum set of project indicators which appear in the GEF SGP global database, in combination with the global performance indicators in the OP4 strategy. The list of global indicators found in the OP4 strategy will be added to the current list of existing database indicators, in order to make country-level measurement of OP4 results possible. As a result, project-level indicators in the database will aggregate in a meaningful way towards results monitored at the global level.
    

59. 
    The enhanced M&E system, including spatial and geographical data, will allow for tracking of both project-level indicators (already in the database and current CPS strategies), as well as the global OP4 outcome indicators, at different levels. Each country programme will be required to aggregate a group of up to five country-level programme outcomes through the database reporting. All OP4 global outcomes and indicators for the different GEF focal areas have been aligned in March 2007 with the current GEF4 strategic priorities.
    

Goal of the Fourth Operational Phase: Global environmental benefits secured in the GEF focal areas through community-based initiatives and actions

Objective 1. Focal Area Results: Consolidate community-based interventions through focused GEF SGP country programme portfolios, in alignment with GEF-4 focal area strategic priorities

Outcome 1. Sustainable community protected area governance approaches recognized, strengthened, and adopted by national partners, protected area systems, and multilateral processes

60. 
    The main objective of the biodiversity focal area in GEF4 will be to work with all GEF SGP country programs to promote community protected area governance approaches (community-based and collaborative management arrangements) for protected areas (PAs), as well as to extend the recognition, strengthening and adoption of Community Conserved Areas (CCAs), including indigenous areas. In particular, GEF SGP will prioritize efforts to engage the ‘Like-minded group of Megadiverse countries’ within GEF SGP to either initiate efforts or adopt steps to recognize community-based and collaborative approaches to PAs, indigenous areas and CCAs.
    

61. 
    OP4 will build on the baseline figures from OP3 in order to consolidate GEF SGP activities around GEF priority areas and critical ecosystems. With a special emphasis on “mature” GEF SGP country programmes, GEF SGP will extend its community-based conservation at the landscape-level for priority areas such as natural World Heritage sites, Biosphere Reserves, biological corridors, hotspots, and important bird areas.
    

62. 
    Since most CCAs and indigenous areas are currently unrecognized at the policy level in most GEF SGP countries, OP4 will work towards the recognition of CCAs (indigenous territories in particular) as legitimate governance models and to incorporate them in legislation and policy, as appropriate to each context. This will be done with guidance from the CBD, which provides a mandate for the GEF SGP to develop good practice models in the area of engagement of local and indigenous peoples in conservation. GEF SGP will work in strategic alliance with the IUCN Theme on Indigenous, Local Peoples and Equity and Protected Areas.
    

63. 
    In May 2007, IUCN will convene a protected areas categories summit in Almeria, Spain, which will provide an important policy forum for the advancement of the community protected area governance approach, including the possible inclusion of indigenous areas and CCAs in the World Protected Area Database of UNEP-WCMC. To this end, it is important to recognize that numerous recent studies have documented the extensive overlap between CCAs and areas of high globally significant biodiversity. GEF SGP country portfolios will therefore seek to influence PA landscape designations at the national level through replication, and up-scaling of successful demonstration projects to recognize and strengthen CCA and collaborative management approaches.
    

64. 
    Geographic areas: ‘Natural World Heritage “COMPACT” demonstration sites’ will include the following countries: Belize, Cambodia, Dominica, Ethiopia, Jordan, Kenya, Mali, Mauritania, Madagascar, Mexico, Mongolia, Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania, Yemen, and Zimbabwe. Community-conserved areas of the world will target assistance to countries to include: Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, India, Indonesia, Iran, Fiji, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Namibia, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, South Africa, Samoa, Uganda, Tanzania, and Vanuatu.