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Commonwealth NGOs
related to forestry | | |
 Integrated Rural Development and Nature
Conservation
2nd Floor Kenya House
Robert Mugabe Avenue
Windhoek
Namibia
Email: irdnc@iafrica.com.na
Website: www.irdnc.org.na
Type: NGO
Scope: national
Interest in Forestry: peripheral
Description
Mission Statement: IRDNC Trust strives to improve the lives of rural people by diversifying the socio-economy
in Namibia’s communal areas to include wildlife and other valuable natural resources.
We believe this will, in turn, secure a long-term place for wild animals outside of national parks,
and significantly reduce the pressure on these areas in the future. The Trust further aims to build
up the
capacity of rural Namibians, and to assist them to develop a civil society whose members can sustainably
manage and benefit from their local natural resources.
What we do: IRDNC provides field-based technical support to help communities form conservancies and
to assist these community-based organizations to become fully self-sufficient, earning enough
income to cover management costs and to make a profit for their shareholders. Our support to conservancies
includes:
* Training in natural resource management
* Community capacity-building, institutional development
* Facilitation of income-generating enterprises
* Interim financial and logistic assistance
We believe these activities are improving the management of natural resources, diversifying local economies
and strengthening civil society. Since the first four conservancies were gazetted in 1998,
two conservancies mentored by IRDNC have already become financially independent of donor support. Currently
IRDNC is working with more than 40 registered and emerging conservancies in
Kunene and Caprivi.
Our vision for the future: A Namibia where:
* rural poverty has been diminished by wise management of natural resources by local users in communal
areas
* wildlife is conserved both inside and outside our national parks
* people continue to be empowered to make decisions about collective management of their natural resources
and a strong civil society has emerged in communal areas
* management of wild and domestic animals, water, forests, other plant resources, grazing, and fresh-water
fish is integrated, with government and NGO inputs co-ordinated by local institutions such
as conservancies
* conservancies are well managed, accountable, transparent and effective community institutions
* the Namibian Government, communities and their traditional leaders, private enterprise and NGOs are
strong partners, building up our country together
* bio-diversity conservation and rural development are linked, not just in Namibia but also in neighboring
countries
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