The Environmental NGO Experience Exchange Meeting and the 2016-2018 GEF Small Grants Programme China was held in Yangling, Shaanxi on September 27-28, 2018. The Yunnan Xundian Climate-Smart Agriculture Demonstration Project is also a funded project in this period. Michael Heilman, Chief Representative of HUMANA PEOPLE TO PEOPLE, was invited to attend the meeting on behalf of Kunming Wild Environmental Development Research Institute. In addition, more than 20 representatives from 8 non-governmental organizations across the country, including National Forestry and Grassland Administration, China International Philanthropy Institute of Shenzhen, Conservation International, Oxfam Hong Kong (Beijing), China Environmental Protection Foundation and members of National steering committee of Small Grants Programme China of Tsinghua University, media reporters and representatives of other stakeholders, also attended the meeting.

Liu Yi, China National Project Coordinator of the Small Grants Programme China, first introduced the members of the National Steering Committee, the recipient institutions and the conference background at the opening ceremony. After the opening ceremony, representatives of the project implementation institutions reported the project contents and summarized the achievements of the project implementation, including: demonstrating climate-smart agricultural technologies and methods to reduce agricultural carbon emissions; promoting the planting mode of wide forests and fungi, to establish the poverty alleviation mechanism of the whole industry chain of ecotourism, ecological agriculture, and ecological protection; carrying out ecological restoration and landscape comprehensive management of degraded natural forest land, and forming the agroforestry compound management and compound system of agriculture, forestry and breeding by the agroforestry method; achieving water saving, reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and protection of farmland biodiversity by the climate-smart agricultural method; disposing waste electrical and electronic products through the establishment of community recycling systems; raising awareness of the rational disposal of discarded electrical and electronic products of small vendors and individual recyclers through publicity, conducting online transactions on established platforms with formal dismantling enterprises, and reducing emissions of persistent organic pollutants and heavy metal pollutants; improving the comprehensive capacity building of local marine environmental protection institutions including professional level, fundraising capacity, project planning and management capabilities through training; developing garbage classification training class system, community activity kit and training workshops of garbage classification techniques to enhance the working skills of social organizations and dissemination of experience sharing; protecting the karst ecosystem in southwestern Guangxi effectively through establishment of community protection areas. Attendees also discussed how NGO can manage projects effectively and promote them, and what external support is required.

On the second day of the meeting, members of the National Steering Committee and NGO representatives visited the ecological restoration and agricultural comprehensive utilization and demonstration project base in Zhanglong Village, Zhouzhi County, supported by GEF Small Grants Programme. The representative from Yangling Association of Senior Scientific Education Workers explained the principle of ecologically planting edible fungi such as Lentinula edodes and coprinus comatus under the apricot forest to increase the productivity of the forest and optimize the planting structure on the demonstration base of forest and fungus cultivation. Later, the attendees went to the Innovation Park of Yangling Modern Agriculture Demonstration Park and visited agricultural high-tech such as three-dimensional cultivation and soilless cultivation.

About the Project:

Yunnan Xundian Climate-Smart Agriculture Demonstration Project is funded by the GEF Small Grants Programme supported by the United Nations Development Programme, and it is located in Xundian Yi and Hui Autonomous County, Kunming City, Yunnan Province. The project was launched on October 31, 2016 and lasted for a period of two years. The project is affiliated to the Kunming Wild Environmental Development Research Institute, which is operated by HUMANA PEOPLE TO PEOPLE who works with local villagers to promote crop production, increase income, and cope with climate warming.

The project is to train villagers on response strategies for climate change advocate actions to reduce carbon emissions, improve the capacity of 200 households, local government agencies and other beneficiaries, promote land management and climate-smart agriculture for sustainable agriculture. improve crop production and income of farmers, increase the carbon content of soil, reduce the use of chemical fertilizers, and promote the healthy development of land and local ecology through agricultural planting diversification, interplanting and straw cultivation.

The Project is funded by the GEF Small Grants Programme supported by the United Nations Development Programme.

The article represents the author's own opinion only and does not represent the standpoint of the donor.