| Supporting improved environmental management
Overview
Natural resource-based economic growth – mining, timber, hydropower, and industrial crop plantations – is putting new pressures on the environmental assets on which rural communities traditionally depend. Deforestation is severe, and un sustainable land and water use are rising. Concerns about land security for Lao families and rural communities are also increasing, with potentially serious implications for poverty, equity and the vital access to natural resources.
Environmental degradation combined with rising climate variability have resulted in increasing natural disasters – floods, droughts, erosion, landslides and pests. The high dependence of most rural people on agriculture and surrounding natural resources, together with continued gaps in adapt ation to changing climatic conditions, likewise make the country highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. A need exists to strengthen human and financial capacities to manage natural resources, particularly at community level, and effectively enforce relevant laws.
UNDP supports growth that does not harm the environment. Our work focuses on three priority areas: encouraging all national development planning to recognize links between environmental harm and poverty; strengthening the response to climate change; and improving environmental governance and promoting community-based natural resource management .
A core challenge is to strengthen people's participation in the management of forests, watersheds and wetlands, as well as to ensure that the poorest and most vulnerable people benefit from environmental investments and revenues in Lao PDR.
In light of Lao PDR's dependence on international markets, and subsequent negative effects on income distribution, poverty and overall development, the policies that the Government pursues during the coming years will largely determine whether these assets prove to be a “resource blessing” – or a “resource curse.”
UNDP's support includes policy and technical advice, medium-sized to large projects implemented by Government organizations, and small grants provided to community-based organizations and non-profit associations.
Encouraging all national development planning to recognize links between environmental harm and poverty
Our Poverty-Environment Initiative is part of a global programme, and represents a joint effort led by UNDP and UNEP to help the Government increase the proportion of quality investments with the most benefits for all people and the least impact on the environment. This begins with support to the selection of appropriate investors and consideration of poverty-environment linkages in formulating economic and development policies. Moreover, this is supplemented with development of national capacities to negotiate deals to ensure compliance with environmental frameworks, as well as practical management tools and systems to help achieve these goals.
Strengthening the response to climate change
UNDP has provided strategic guidance to the Government to develop a comprehensive and consolidated response to challenges related to climate change. It has assisted the Government in developing Lao PDR's First National Communication on Climate Change to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, and is currently providing support to the Second National Communication. It also has assisted with development of the National Adaptation Plan of Action. These important documents, together with the National Strategy on Climate Change, constitute the backbone of the Government's policy framework for a preventing and responding to climate change.
The Government, together with UNDP, is now developing a number of projects to address the priority sectors for climate change adaptation identified in the National Adaptation Plan of Action. These priority sectors include agriculture, water resources and forestry. UNDP, through the Global Environment Facility Small Grants Programme, also is providing small grants for climate change responses developed by communities and local non-profit associations.
Improving environmental governance and promoting community-based natural resource management
Lao PDR's national legal framework related to environmental management is well-developed and relatively recent ( Possible LINK to Forest Law, Fisheries Law, Wildlife Law, Environmental Protection Law, Land Law ). In collaboration with the Government, UNDP has conducted a national self-assessment of capacity needs with regard to implementation of important global environmental conventions (UNFCCC / CBD / UNCCD) by Lao PDR. We also are implementing a follow-up project to the self-assessment, aiming to strengthen capacities at national and local levels for more effective implementation of legislation related to land degradation, biological diversity and climate change.
UNDP's assistance in the area of participatory natural resources management includes the provision of small grants for community-based natural resource management and biodiversity conservation activities. A larger project aims at improved conservation and sustainable use by communities of agricultural biodiversity in upland areas, with a focus on attainment of food security and sustainable economic development. Other projects are being developed to link the improvement of small-scale irrigation with watershed and fisheries co-management, and to improve climate change resilience through participatory management of village forest, wetlands and river fisheries. All are expected to contribute to an improved policy and legal framework. |
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