Project News

Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (MAF) of the Government of Timor-Leste have started a joint project named "The Project for Community-Based Sustainable Natural Resource Management," in January 2011. The primary objective of the joint project is to establish an operational mechanism of community-based natural resource management (CB-NRM) on a village level. Specifically, the Project aims to fulfill the following missions in the course of the Project:

1. Development, introduction, and implementation of future land use plans with the village regulations in the selected project villages in the target river basins;
2. Enhancement of capacities of the staff of the implementing agency as well as other relevant organizations; and
3. Assistance in the formulation of a new policy document on introduction/promotion of CB-NRM in the target river basins.

JICA had assisted MAF in the formulation of a community-based integrated watershed management plan for the Laclo and Comoro river basins through the implementation of a development study named "the Study on Community-Based Integrated Watershed Management in Laclo and Comoro River Basins" from November 2005 to March 2010. Through the said study, JICA had implemented a total of 10 pilot projects, such as introduction of participatory land use planning, promotion of tree planting, promotion of sloping agriculture techniques, and assistance in livelihood development, in four pilot project villages in addition to the formulation of an integrated watershed management plan for the said river basins.

The Laclo and Comoro river basins are two of the 10 critically degraded watersheds in the country but have the specific important values, namely, as the catchment area for the Laclo irrigation system and as the area that encompasses the source of water supply to Dili city, respectively. In spite of their crucial values, forest degradation and deforestation have progressed in both river basins over the years. As forest degradation has progressed, the forest functions in the river basins, such as reduction of sedimentation, stabilization of river flow, etc., have also declined and livelihoods of the people living in and around the river basins have become quite vulnerable.

Although the said study developed the integrated watershed management plan for both river basins, the Government of Timor-Leste further requested JICA to assist MAF in the enhancement of the capacities of its staff to implement the management plan along with the establishment of an implementation framework for introduction of community-based sustainable natural resource management on a village level. JICA and MAF agreed to implement a new project jointly using the knowledge, procedures, and methodologies gained by the preceding study with due consideration of institutional as well as capacity development of MAF, especially NDF, which the preceding study did not sufficiently dealt with, in August 2010.

The Project is to be implemented by the JICA Project Team and NDF with the concerned MAF District Office/s for 58 months from January 2011 to October 2015. The project activities on a village level will be carried out mainly in the priority sub-watersheds, the Noru sub-watershed and Bemos sub-watershed, in the Laclo and Comoro river basins, respectively.

To introduce the progress of the project and accomplishments made, we will issue the project newsletter periodically. The first volume of the newsletter, which introduces the background, objectives, and expected outputs of the Project, is attached hereto.

• Newsletter Volume No. 1 (PDF/432KB)