UNDP's
work on biodiversity:
project
showcase
GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT FACILITY
The only multi-convention financing facility in existence, GEF serves as the financial mechanism for both the Convention on Biological Diversity and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. GEF operates in collaboration and partnership with three implementing agencies (UNDP, UNEP, and the World Bank) for the purpose of achieving global environmental benefits.
On behalf of the GEF partnership, UNDP / GEF also manages two corporate programmes, the Small Grants Programme (SGP), and the Country Dialogue Workshop (CDW). The CDW Programme promotes country ownership of the GEF, facilitates national coordination, and builds awareness through targeted, multi-stakeholder workshops that engage countries in a direct dialogue on national priorities and the GEF. The GEF Council has recently given the go ahead for a new National Consultative Dialogue Initiative, designed to replace the CDW and to begin work on a new phase of multi-stakeholder dialogues.
In 1999, the GEF Council approved the ‘Capacity Development Initiative’ (CDI), which comprehensively assesses the biodiversity capacity building needs of countries in the context of broader international efforts. Priorities are generally decided by the countries themselves and funding is flexible in order to properly meet local needs.
Specifically, UNDP / GEF supports the development of projects in the environmental focal areas of biodiversity, climate change, international waters, ozone depletion, persistent organic pollutants and land degradation. UNDP / GEF projects in biodiversity seek to help countries protect the global environment through an ecosystem approach that will have long-term benefits. Loss of biodiversity impacts not only the ecological, genetic and aesthetic concerns of the global community, but also affects sustainable development, and has social, economic, cultural and educational consequences. In this regard, the development of scientific, technical and institutional capacity is often an intrinsic part of UNDP / GEF projects in biodiversity. Projects aim to address the various root causes of reduction of biological diversity, with a focus on sustainable use that allows local communities involved to see socio-economic benefits.
UNDP / GEF works by providing the funds to allow projects to take place. These grants are usually awarded on the basis of applications from project instigators at the national level. Three types of grants are awarded, depending on the nature of the proposed project: Full Project grants (for which more than $1,000,000 is requested from the GEF), Medium Sized Project grants (for which less than $1,000,000 is requested from the GEF) and Enabling Activities. Enabling Activities in the focal area of biodiversity assist recipient countries to prepare the groundwork for meeting their commitment to achieve the objectives of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The grants are used to facilitate the development of national strategies, plans or programmes, and to help with the identification of processes and activities that may have considerable negative effects on the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity.
Through February 2000, GEF allocated over one billion dollars to 345 biodiversity projects and enabling activities, matched by almost $1.7 billion in co-financing. These projects fall under the following categories of Operational Programmes:
>> Arid and Semi-arid Ecosystems
>> Coastal, Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems
>> Forest Ecosystems>> Mountain Ecosystems
>> Integrated Ecosystem Management (Multifocal)>> Conservation and Sustainable Use of Biological Diversity Important to Agriculture
Further information:
A more detailed introduction to the work of UNDP / GEF
A more detailed introduction to GEF's work on biodiversity
Online resources:
UNDP / GEF biodiversity homepage
UNDP / GEF Project Websites:
Conservation and Sustainable Use of Dryland Agrobiodiversity (Lebanon)Southern Africa Botanical Diversity Network (SABONET)
Cambodia: Cardamom Mountains Project
Mountain Areas Conservancy Project
Conservation of the Asiatic CheetahConservation of Biodiversity in the Lake Titicaca Basin
UNDP / GEF's global database of local projects:
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