IPSI Activities at IUCN World Parks Congress 2014

The IUCN World Parks Congress is one of the largest meetings for protected areas and their sustainable management, and is held only once in a decade. IPSI members and the IPSI Secretariat have been contributing to the preparation process including attending preliminary meetings such as the 1st Asia Parks Congress in Sendai, Japan in 2013 and the IV Mesoamerican Congress on Protected Areas held in San José, Costa Rica earlier this year, and both the Satoyama Initiative and IPSI were featured prominently in a number of events at the World Parks Congress in Sydney, Australia from 12 to 19 November.

IPSI Secretariat staff from UNU-IAS helped to organize or took part in sessions within Stream 6 on "Enhancing Diversity and Quality of Governance" and Stream 7 on "Respecting Indigenous and Traditional Knowledge and Culture", and also cooperated in organizing three side events at the Congress:

• "Inspiring Tools for Enhancing Sustainability", organized by UNU-IAS on 13 November
• “The Satoyama Concept: Theory and Practice”, organized by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) on 14 November
• "Production landscapes and protected areas: approaches of the Satoyama Initiative”, organized by UNU-IAS and the IPSI Secretariat on 17 November

We also had the chance to meet representatives from and attend a wide variety of events with IPSI members, including those who informed us of their events in advance such as UNDP, FPP, TEBTEBBA, Asociacion ANDES, FIDES, National Dong Hwa University, SPREP, Bioversity International, Conservation International, GEF, IPCCA, and IMPECT, and also many others.

We are happy to inform you that all of the events we helped to plan were well attended, and we were very encouraged by reactions to the concepts of the Satoyama Initiative and our work within the IPSI partnership. We were struck by the extent to which the idea of sustainable management of production landscapes and seascapes as a vital factor within and without protected areas has taken hold in the global discourse on biodiversity and sustainability, and we look forward to building on the momentum that has been created so far.

More details and presentation files from each event will be made available on the IPSI website, so please be sure to check for more information.

Publication: Toolkit for the Indicators of Resilience in Socio-Ecological Production Landscapes and Seascapes

The “Toolkit for the Indicators of Resilience in Socio-ecological Production Landscapes and Seascapes (SEPLS)” has been published and was officially launched at an event on 17 November 2014, held parallel to the IUCN World Parks Congress 2014 in Sydney, Australia. The Toolkit is a major output of a IPSI Collaborative Activity carried out by UNU-IAS, Bioversity International, UNDP-COMDEKS, and the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES). This project was a continuation of a previous Collaborative Activity by UNU-IAS and Bioversity International, in which the Indicators themselves were developed, and included a revision of the Indicators based on their field-testing and application around the world over the past two years. The revised Indicators and a manual for their practical application in the field have now been compiled into the Toolkit publication.

The Toolkit contains practical advice for holding resilience assessment workshops in local communities, to assist community members themselves in measuring, comprehending, and evaluating the resilience of their own landscapes and seascapes. It is also intended for use as an effective tool for researchers and development practitioners to understand resilience and develop resilience-strengthening management strategies.

The Toolkit is available in electronic form for download on the IPSI website here.

International Symposium on Hokusetsu Satoyama

An international symposium titled “From Hokusetsu Region to the World: our Satoyama” will be held on 30 November 2014 at the Takarazuka Hotel in Takarazuka City, Japan. The symposium will feature presentations by a number of experts on satoyama and sustainable management of production landscapes around the world, including the IPSI Secretariat’s own Wataru Suzuki and IPSI member the Indigenous Peoples and Biodiversity Program (TEBTEBBA)’s Florence Daguitan. An excursion will also be made on 1 December to landscape sites near Takarazuka City.

A flyer for the symposium is available for download here: Flyer_SATOYAMA Symposium_141014

Technical Workshop of the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI)

On 21 October 2014, a half-day workshop was held in Okinawa, Japan to discuss the engagement of diverse sectors and community-based management for coral reef conservation. The workshop was organized by the Secretariat of the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI), currently co-chaired by the governments of Japan and Thailand.

The IPSI Secretariat was invited in the workshop in order to introduce the concept of the Satoyama Initiative, covering seascapes including coral reef ecosystems, and IPSI activities.

Following three presentations on projects related to coral reefs in different parts of the world, Dr. Kaoru Ichikawa of the IPSI Secretariat gave a presentation explaining how the results of these kinds of diverse activities are shared within IPSI, and describing the IPSI case study mechanism and our regularly held meetings and workshops.

The workshop provided an excellent opportunity to raise awareness of IPSI and its activities among a new audience, working mostly in seascapes. We look forward to further collaboration with ICRI in the future. For more information on the workshop, including presentation files, please see the ICRI website.

New Member Profile: Conservation Alliance International

Conservation Alliance International (CA) is a regional environmental non-profit organization with its regional office in Accra, Ghana. CA brings together the people and skills needed to build Africa’s capacity to conserve biodiversity through sound science, local initiatives and good governance. CA works with strategic partners to empower communities to lead in biodiversity conservation and create opportunities for economic growth and improved human well-being. It also works with industry to ensure that best practices are followed in the use of natural resources, in line with its vision to conserve global biodiversity for human development.

A multidisciplinary orientation provides a strong platform for discussing rural policy issues and increasing awareness of why investment in natural resources management and rural development is critical to reducing poverty, improving food security and enhancing biodiversity conservation. CA’s greatest asset is its staff members, who display sustained passion and courage in ensuring the sustainable management of natural resources.

CA has offices in six West African countries: Ghana, Nigeria, Liberia, Cote d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Cameroon. All country activities are coordinated through country offices that also supervise several field offices. The Ghana office serves as the regional headquarters.

In each country, the primary focus is on six main thematic areas:

• Cocoa and Agriculture
• Integrating Biodiversity in Development
• Research and Monitoring,
• Water, Sanitation and Hygiene
• Climate Change, REDD+ and Renewable Energy
• Public Policy

Partnership is CA’s mode of operation; CA collaborates with private sector, government agencies, non- profit organizations, traditional authorities and rural communities to implement its programs. A Board of Directors ensures that all programs are deeply rooted in the 10-year strategic plan. The CA website (http://www.conservealliance.org) is an important source of information for the public.

Recent Case Studies: National Dong Hwa University

The IPSI Secretariat recently received a case study report from member National Dong-Hwa University in Chinese Taipei, titled "Collaborative Planning and Management of Socio-Ecological Production Landscapes: a Rice Paddy Cultural Landscape Conservation in an Indigenous Community, Taiwan".

In 2005, the idea of landscape/seascape conservation was introduced into the amended Cultural Heritage Preservation Act as a new legal subject entitled ‘Cultural Landscape' in Chinese Taipei. A pilot study area of a rice paddy production landscape in the indigenous Fengnan village, Hualien County was selected as a potential Cultural Landscape site. A participatory action research was conducted by the researcher in light of the collaborative planning theory and methods to enhance partnership among the villagers, local authorities and experts. Various formal and informal forums were conducted in the local area from 2011 to 2014 to achieve consensus on the Codes of Conduct as well as the Management Plan for the Cultural Landscape. Through intense communication on the forums, stakeholders jointly designated the site as a legal Cultural Landscape, developed a mid-term Cultural Landscape Conservation Plan and set up a local management committee for implementation of the Plan.

The case study shows that a landscape approach based on the idea of the Satoyama Initiative and ICCA can be more welcomed by local people and create a new style of ‘living' protected landscape into the national protected area system.

The full write-up of the case study can be found on the IPSI website here.

Contact

Please be sure to let the Secretariat know if there are any changes in your e-mail address or contact information.

Secretariat of the International Partnership for the Satoyama Initiative
5–53–70 Jingumae
Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-8925
Japan

Tel: +81 3-5467-1212
Fax: +81 3-3499-2828

Email: isi@unu.edu

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