Community Initiatives for Biodiversity Conservation
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Mission Statement
CIBIC recruits, trains and supports park edge indigenous Batwa Pygmies, Reformed poachers as well as women and youth in conservation agriculture as an alternative source of food and income as opposed to poaching.
About This Cause
CIBIC BACKGROUND INFORMATION Community Initiatives for Biodiversity Conservation (CIBIC) is now a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) that was initiated in 2012 as a community Based Organization by the community members neighboring Bwindi Impenetrable National Park (BINP), CIBIC graduated to the status of NGO in December 2020. CIBIC is owned and operated by the local community. It is registered with the government of Uganda as Non-Governmental Organisation with NGO operating permit No. 6341. It was formed to contribute to the conservation of nature through sustainable organic agriculture for combating malnutrition, hunger and poverty and reduce pressure on the national parks. CIBIC goal is to establish an environment where humanity and nature live in harmony. With new status of the NGO, CIBIC is will work nationwide in the park Edge communities where Uganda have National Parks. CIBIC is located in Buhoma Village, Kayonza Subcounty, Kanungu District in south western Uganda. CIBIC operates a registered farmers cooperative society to enable farmers access revolving seed loans for self sufficiency. CIBIC GOVERNING STRUCTURE Community Initiatives for Biodiversity Conservation is governed by the board of directors, an the Management committee. The board meets quarterly to plan for the Organisation: It approve the budget, review, sign, and assure submission of annual reports. Review and authorize personnel policies relevant to hiring, promotion, dismissal, compensation, whistleblowers, independent contractors, key employees, and fairness to the disabled and other groups. Review and approve plans of the organization, growth, review and approve plans for major asset sales and acquisition. Review and approve major changes in retirement, benefits, and compensation for all employees, with special focus on reasonableness for top executives. The Executive Director prays the role of coordinating the Organisation projects and programs and making sure the Organisation employees all work to achieve goals and objectives of the Organisation. LIST OF MEMBERS OF GOVERNING BODY CIBIC Board is composed of 10 officials including 3 Ex-official members. 1. Patron: Mr. Sam Kajojo, chairman Local Council 5 Kanungu. Responsible for overall political leadership for Kanungu District. He is an Ex official on the board 2. Chairman: Mr Tusime Caleb Kahima. Former Conservation officer at Uganda wildlife Authority (UWA) the government body responsible for conservation of wildlife and promotion of tourism in the country. He is also currently serving as the Chairman for Buhoma Community Sacco, a responsible job he has been doing for the last 6 years. 3. Vice Chairman: Mr.Keneth Turyamubona. The former Batwa Development Program Coordinator in Uganda, an Organisation responsible for improving livelihood of Batwa holistically. He represents the Indigenous Batwa on the board. 4. Secretary: Mrs. Tushemerirwe Gloria. A Prominent self-employed local farmer in the region. An independent entrepreneur who provide sustainable foods for the locals. A co-founder of CIBIC 5. Vice Secretary: Mr. Twesigye Yonah, The field manager for Kayonza Growers Tea Factory responsible for production of quality processed tea for local consumption and export worldwide. He is also the Sub county Extension worker for Kayonza. 6. Treasurer: Mrs. Orikyiriza Jemimah, Former accountant at Buhoma Mukono Development Association, a local NGO working through tourism related business to provide incomes for the locals. 7. Member: Mr.Tumwesigye Christopher, The Missioner for Kyeshero Church of Uganda responsible for spiritual growth and bringing people to Jesus Christ. 8. Member: Mr. Mugyenyi Sadayo. Reformed Poacher representative on the board. Not employed formally. Sadayo have been key mobilizer for the reformed poachers since 2012 9. Ex-official: Barbra Mugisha. Community Conservation Worden Bwindi National park. The park is the world heritage site and a home of wildlife. 10. Ex. Official. Mr. Tusingwire John Bosco, Founding Director CIBIC, CORE VALUES: i. God fearing ii. Human life first iii. Poverty and hunger free communities iv. Sustainable environment v. Pro poor tourism vi. Climate justice. VISION: Protected areas surrounding communities living in harmony with nature ACTIVITIES: 1. Enhance Conservation agriculture awareness and education through Music Dance and Drama by recruiting reformed poachers, Batwa pygmies and women and training and supporting them in sustainable agriculture as a way of creating alternative source of livelihood as opposed to poaching from the national parks. 2. CIBIC promotes pro poor tourism connecting rural farmers with tourist lodges for fresh food supplies enabling park edge neighboring people to benefit from nature conservation. 3. Climate change mitigation and adaptation including plastic waste recycling, climate smart adaptive agriculture 4. Demonstrates to the community member’s sustainable farming practices of mushroom, bees, fish, vegetables, goats and poultry which can impact on their livelihoods and on wild life. CIBIC uses part of the produce to give relief food to the needy community members including hospitalized patients. 5. Training and supporting school drop outs with knowledge and skills for self sufficiency in agriculture. ACHIEVEMENTS AND MILESTONES: 1. CIBIC maintained her cooperation with BDP to sustain Batwa livelihoods through agriculture. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Batwa Development Program (BDP) and CIBIC was signed in 2018 to help the Batwa exit hunger and poverty through sustainable agriculture. Over 500 Indiginous Batwa are now able to practice sustainable agriculture, sell their produce to make an income and largely enjoy their fresh organic food. 2. CIBIC operates a cooperative society with Village Savings and Loans Association (VSLA) Model. It is called reformed poachers and Batwa Farmers’ Cooperative society Limited. The society registered 720 members in 22 VSLAs in 2020. The Coop is working to train and support its members grow enough food on commercial scale and engage in agro processing of maize. 3. CIBIC is leading in bee conservation and honey production an initiative that is conserving around 20,000,000 bees in 107 bee hives enhancing ecosystem regrowth and food production. The apiaries are managed by the Batwa and Reformed poacher families. 4. In 2019 CIBIC also found it important to rehabilitate Reformed Poachers and Batwa talented young men and women. CIBIC recruited and trained them in conservation education dance and drama for the purpose of promoting awareness on climate change mitigation measures, environmental health, and alternative livelihood projects as opposed to poaching and teaching people to reform from poaching and be self-sufficient. This initiative have reformed 108 poachers and handed over their poaching tools to the office, an initiative that have reduced plastic littering in the environment, forest fires and poaching in Bwindi National park and neighboring communities. 5. In 2020 CIBIC started climate change actions demonstrating how to recycle plastics by turning it into art and craft and building rain water harvesting tanks and houses made of plastics instead of burnt soil bricks. The Project has collected 5 tons of plastics and recycled 2% into art and bricks. 6. Many of the Batwa pygmies and Reformed poachers when they get sick, the situation is worsened with no food and income. CIBIC have been supporting hospitalized patients weekly with fish, vegetables and medicinal honey at the critical time of need. Every week, CIBIC supplies 60 kg of food to patients at Bwindi Community Hospital. 7. CIBIC is also pleased and proud to have started agricultural classes in schools, and around 4 community schools have agricultural program with a teacher and a student representative, each school have a school garden where students can learn from and harvest nutritious vegetables. CIBIC FUTURE PLANS 1. CIBIC will build the training center and enhance agricultural training for the youth in short sustainable agricultural courses of six months at the Organisation secretariat in Buhoma and support them with starting loans through the cooperative society to start their own climate smart agricultural enterprises. 2. CIBIC plans to extend her activities to queen Elizabeth National park. It is important that the communities around Queen Elizabeth National Park learn and adopt innovative technologies of chasing away elephants from their fields other than shooting and killing them. These communities must also not think that they can’t have food in the dry season because it is savanna, a dry climatic zone; they need to learn and develop technologies of harvesting water through recycling plastics. The rain water harvesting tanks can be for home use and irrigation of high value crops. Communities need to have knowledge about benefit of nature conservation through Music Dance and Drama and extension services. 3. CIBIC will empower the sensitization team so that everyone around 2 national parks knows the importance of nature conservation and what they can do to be in harmony with nature. Our goal is to reform 100% of the poaching practices due to poverty and hunger by the year 2022 by empowering the reformed victims with alternative livelihood projects for self-sufficiency. The efforts will be a success with so many food supply contracts signed between tourism lodges and CIBIC. 4. CIBIC will promote climate change awareness and support climate smart adaptation agricultural practices CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS 1. CIBIC is village based Non-Governmental Organisation that has not yet attracted much attention of the big funders; this has caused delays in implementation of important activities. CIBIC is continuously selling its self to big funders through proper implementation of small grants and sharing reports as well as through social media. 2. CIBIC still lacks the capacity to recruit and maintain highly qualified and experienced staff. It is strategizing to gain the capacity with time as potential partner show commitment to work with CIBIC.