CEI-Inde-Perou

Most people living in Naddi have a few cows and/or a few goats. They let them graze during the summer and cut fodder during the post monsoon months (October, November, December) in the fields and in the forests to feed them. This fodder can be grass, shrub leaves or tree leaves.

An Indian goat

Besides, they use a lot of wood as fuel to cook and to heat their houses in winter. This wood comes from the forests’ trees. This wood-cutting mainly concerns lower branches and is called lopping.

As the population and living standards increase, more wood and more fodder is needed. As a consequence, a practice that used to be sustainable is becoming a danger for the forests’ health. A decrease in forests health means a decrease in the benefits they can bring:

Carbon sequestration, soil retainers, biodiversity pools (there are hundreds of medicinal plants that are still used in traditional Ayurvedic medicine in India), landscapes (which bring more and more tourists)…

The aim of our work is to reduce the pressure of lopping to protect the remaining “nearly wild “ forests.

One of the projects is basically environmental education to the communities living next to the forest; Basic things about what is a soil, what is a tree and how beneficial they can be to human beings and to the earth. Aside I am working on courses dealing with what can be improved in the way they collect wood.

The second project I am leading is a reforestation plan of about one hectare located just above one of the communities the NGO is working with. This land is very steep and is covered with just a few remaining trees and bushes. During monsoons, small landslides happen and create a threat to the community. Reforesting will retain the soil but will also provide, on the long term, more fodder (tree leaves) as we plan to leave all the shrubs which leaves are eaten by goats. There will be no fodder loss and it will reduce lopping pressure on the other forests.

In red the reforestation project above Sheynne community.

For this project, I will be helped by Himachal Forest Department which owns the land and which regularly reforest areas in the State. However we will try to diversify as much as possible the tree species we will plant (to have the maximum impact on biodiversity increase) and we will take in consideration the needs of the people living there so that they can feel and be involved in the process which won’t work without their engagement. Indeed, a lot of reforestation projects fail because cows and goats graze the trees before they are old enough to survive.

These are the two main projects I am now working on. But I am also taking part in other projects led by interns such as building relationships with the kids from the communities to have them engaged more in our work.

Abu, one of the youngest children in Sheynne community

Some children from Sheynne community : From the right to the left, Ajay, Rajat, Prya, Milan and Sunana.