Rationale

Africa is phenomenally rich in biodiversity and conservation assets and is culturally diverse with a deep knowledge, supporting institutions, and understanding about sustainable and integrated land (and water) management. Yet much of this knowledge is unknown, unseen, and undocumented. There’s global momentum behind implementing the Kunming-Montreal GBF and this can highlight Africa’s practical experience; ensure that it is built on and reinforced where weak; respected at national, ministerial, regional, and global levels; and models African leadership and ownership of its conservation agenda. Biodiversity strategic action plans are underway at the national, sub regional and continental level.  The Africa Biodiversity Strategy Action Plan alongside sub emerging sub regional biodiversity strategic action plans provide a framing and guidance on priorities for Africa.

At present the targets tend to focus on “formal” Protected Areas. Further attention and action should focus on other forms of conserved areas – especially Community Conserved Areas (CCAs). Successful models of CCAs e.g. sacred groves of Ghana or the Kaya forests of Kenya present viable community-led conservation. Very few of these CCAs are registered nationally or globally as Indigenous and Community Conserved Areas (CCAs) or Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECM), which limits holistic understanding of their role in achieving Target 3.

Further, as about 70% of Africa’s population are youth, their integration as decisionmakers, implementers, and actors is fundamental to the future of conservation. Yet they are under-involved. There is a need to better understand the scale and extent of youth engagement in conservation, in terms of implementation and policy support. This overview of “Africa Day” is a draft to trigger dialogue and interest in having a group of partners to develop the event concepts and frame the day to deliver.

Objectives for the Day

Overarching purpose: to recognize the scale and extent of PCAs/CCAs across Africa, their opportunities and challenges and agree on practical strategies into the future. The more detailed objectives include to:

Understand how rural people manage CCAs and agree on strategies to recognize CCAs at national, regional, and continental levels.

Demonstrate how CCAs contribute to PA security and as ICCAs/OECM in achieving GBF and how this can leverage the necessary finance needed by States, APADs and the stewards of CCAs.

Understand the important roles PCAs and CCAs play in adapting and mitigating climate change, understand why PCAs and CCAs are vulnerable to climate change.

Recognize the scale and extent of PCAs /CCAs across Africa and the role youth and IPLCs play and should play.

Agree on strategies to better recognize Youth as vitally important stewards for CCAs and conservation at national, regional, and continental levels.

Highlight the importance of Youth supported and led efforts, activities, and their capacity building.

Highlight innovative financing approaches and how domestic resource mobilization can be leveraged against other international sources.

Broad Approach

Different organizations with the requisite experience will nominate key staff members early on to plan for and implement the event. Each session will have a high-level moderator with experience in the topic. This will be followed by 1-2 keynote addresses to set the scene for the event. There will be various panels (4-6 people) with a mix of panelists (High level Ministerial representation and of African Institutions – RECs, EAC, SADC, COMIFAC, ECOWAS) to set the scene for how CCAs and PCAs can better achieve the GBF targets. Such panels of 4-5 people will address specific issues and objectives. The panels can be high level ministerial, senior level Government and International Organizations, and will ensure that IPLCs, gender and youth (as the future stewards of conservation) are well represented in all the events.

Outputs

There will be agreement on practical strategies and actions will be reached with respect all types of PCAs and CCAs at national, regional, and continental levels. The Africa day will agree on the differing roles & responsibilities of different groups (Government, IPLCs, Gender, Youth, State-Non-State). It is hoped that Governments will lead and support actions delivering on inclusive conservation, e.g. tracking commitments to gender, youth and IPLCs participation. There will be agreement on how these actions support adaptation and mitigation at national and local levels; and agreement on the differing roles & responsibilities of different groups (Government, APAD, IPLCs, Gender, Youth).

Brief Description of the Events for “Africa Day”

Each event will follow a broadly similar outline, as described in the sections above on planning and logistics, and on the broad approach. The following sections provide a summary for each of the events. Each event will have a thematic focus but will also include some important cross cutting themes: a). Skills and capacity building requirements; b). the important role of youth as the future stewards of conservation; c). The importance of taking gender differentiated approaches; d). Identifying the roles and responsibilities of IPLCs.

Event 1: Key opportunities, barriers and experience for States and people in achieving GBF targets for PCAs and CCAs and in delivering Target 3 and understand why and how people manage CCAs.

This event will focus on delivering target 3, and include a stock take of the status of Target 3 achievements, and the barriers to achieving the target. It will include PCAs, CCAs, ICCAs and OECMs. While state and private PCAs are reasonably well known, the status, scale, and extent of CCAs is much less well known as only a very few are registered as ICCAs or/and OECM. Yet the custodians of such CCAs are critical stakeholders as CCA managers and owners, as well as for the future of conservation.

Event 2: Understanding and enhancing the role PCAs and CCAs play in climate change adaptation and mitigation (Target 8) and understand why PCAs and CCAs are vulnerable to climate change.

The consequences of climate change on PCAs, CCAs, and biodiversity and ecosystems will be highlighted.  The important role that PCAs and CCAs can play in adaptation and mitigation to climate change will be demonstrated. This will be a chance to better integrate the PCA/CCA voice in the climate change discourse, which needs to be better heard and lobbied for.

Event 3: Ensure the economic importance and financing is available for PCAs and CCAs as part of national well-being (Target 11, 18, 19), commensurate with their importance nationally and globally.

This event will highlight the importance of innovative financing mechanisms and the critical role domestic funding plays in anchoring and leveraging funding sources for conservation. It will share lessons from existing practice and approaches and discuss how commensurate existing funding sources are with current needs. This will include understanding and making recommendations on the use of the Biodiversity Economy approach in terms of funding, use and sustainability.

Event 4: Demonstrating the importance of PCAs and CCAs as part of Integrated Landscape Management (ILM).

The event will highlight why and how CCAs are important for “State type” PCAs in terms of connectivity between different forms of protected area, and other forms of land use (agriculture, livestock, urban, etc.) as part of Integrated Landscape Management (ILM). This will demonstrate how important PCAs/CCAs are for others forms of land use and for agriculture (e.g., pollination, soil fertility, agro-biodiversity, and forest management and restoration), livestock (e.g., rangeland biodiversity, pastoralist dry season grazing), and urban land use. This makes the strong case for not converting conservation lands to other forms of land use. In addition, this will also make the case for improvements in and greater ownership of wildlife conflict approaches.

Event 5: Respecting the role of gender and Africa’s youth in conservation, PCAs and CCAs (Target 22, 23).

 This event will explore the role of Africa’s youth in conservation, PCAs and CCAs (Target 22), as they are the stewards of nature into the future and represent approximately 70% of Africa’s population. Highlighting the important roles of Youth, IPLCs and gender in conservation and the practical achievement of GBF is central for sustainability and the future.