•  India and World Bank has signed an agreement of USD 24.64 million for “Ecosystem Service Improvement Project”.
• This project will be financed by the World Bank out of its GEF Trust Fund.

About Ecosystem Service Improvement Project:

• The objective of the Project is to strengthen the institutional capacity of the Departments of Forestry and Community Organisations to enhance forest ecosystem services and improve the livelihoods of forest dependent communities in Central Indian Highlands.
• Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) will implement the Project in the States of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh through Indian Council of Forestry Research & Education under the National Mission for Green India.

Measures to be taken under this project:

• Using only approved and safe bio-control agents and following release and documentation protocols.
• Avoiding using general bio-control agents; use host-specific ones for targeted species.
• Promoting use of bio-fertilizers and bio-pesticides.
• Ensuring that legitimate users are not denied access to resources as a result of declaration.
• Establishing village level participatory monitoring protocols and social audit arrangements for the project.
• Creating village level household beneficiary lists and identifying the most poor, farthest, marginal, and backward beneficiaries.
• Ensuring convergence for alternative employment or income for landless livestock owners during common property resources (CPR) restoration.

About GEF:

• The Global Environment Facility (GEF) was established on the eve of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit to help tackle our planet’s most pressing environmental problems. Since then, the GEF has provided over $17 billion in grants and mobilized an additional $88 billion in financing for more than 4000 projects in 170 countries.