Project News

The 7th Lang Biang World Biosphere Reserve Management Board (LB-BR MB) meeting was held on 6th June 2019 in Dalat City, Lam Dong Province. This meeting mainly shared the knowledge on the project activities with the attendance of more than 70 participants including the international organizations such as USAID, SNV, GIZ, WWF, etc.

At this meeting, first of all, JICA's efforts in LB-BR (this project and the "Project for Strengthening Community-based Management Capacity of Bidoup-Nui Ba National Park" (hereinafter referred to as "previous project") implemented from 2010 to 2014) were presented, and then, Mr. Le Van Huong, Vice chairman of LB-BR MB, explained on the rich biodiversity as well as the cultural values of LB-BR, chal-lenges for its sustainable conservation, and proposed some prioritized activities for LB-BR MB. Next, the representatives of the projects from USAID, SNV and Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, which are currently carrying out the projects in Lam Dong Province, explained the overview of the activi-ties. During the tea break time, in order to further promote the project activities for deeper understanding, the materials such as the ones for environmental education program and various LB-BR promotion goods were displayed and also provided the cooked Shiitake mushroom produced under the support of the project, and these were very well received by participants.

After the meeting, participants including the stakeholder from other projects visited a farmer cultivating Shiitake mushroom supported by the project, the coffee farm, and the manager of the Village Develop-ment Fund (VDF) supported by the previous project and got explanation on those activities and major results. It is worth noting that the participants were able to confirm from the leader of VDF that he has well managed the operation of fund such as lending funds to the villagers, collecting interest and disclos-ing relevant information in fairly and sustainable manners, resulting in continuously contributing to the livelihoods of villagers even after the previous project termination.

Since the remaining period is limited until the end of the project in 2020, it is, of course, expected that the obtained knowledge and the various activities/ developed tools will be utilized by LB-BR MB, and also it is desirable those are utilized by other project stakeholders, that is why we consider that this type of knowledge sharing is very important.

Next LB-BR MB meeting will be held at the end of November 2019.

LB-BR promotion goods, biodiversity photo guidebooks, materials for environmental educa-tion programs, etc. were displayed, and it became a good opportunity for active opinion exchanges among participants.

Group Photo

Visited a farmer cultivating Shiitake mush-room and explained mainly on the importance of quality control and specific efforts for that.

Visited a coffee farm applied organic compost produced with the project support. The partici-pants were able to confirm the better growth conditions clearly compared with the applica-tion of sole chemical fertilizers.