REPUBLIC OF CAMEROON Paix-Travail-Patrie
MINISTERE DE L'ENVIRONNEMENT, DE LA PROTECTION DE LA NATURE ET DU DEVELOPPEMENT DURABLE
SECRETARIAT GENERAL
DIRECTION DE LA CONSERVATION ET DE LA GESTION DES RESSOURCES NATURELLES
REPUBLIC OF CAMEROON Peace-Work-Fatherland
MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT, PROTECTION OF NATURE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
SECRETARIAT GENERAL
DEPARTMENT OF CONSERVATION AND MANAGEMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES
IFAD Investing in rural people
Organisation des Nations Unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture
gef
UICN
CA
CALL FOR EXPRESSION OF INTEREST
00001
08 MAI 2023
/CFEI/MINEPDED/SG/DCGR/LDN/PF-FEM OF
RELATED TO THE RECRUITMENT OF OPERATIONAL STAFF OF:
"GEF Project GCP/CMR/904/GFF "Enabling Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) and mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions in Cameroon's Sudano-Sahelian agro-ecological zone"
A- BRIEF BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT
Cameroon is one of the countries facing the challenges of serious land and ecosystem degradation and climate change. Land degradation is destabilising agro-ecological conditions in the Sudano-Sahelian zone. The Sudano-Sahelian zone has been ecologically assessed as the most fragile agro-ecological zone in Cameroon, with nearly 5 million hectares of severely degraded land. Direct drivers of land degradation include unsustainable agricultural and livestock practices, over-exploitation of firewood for charcoal production, poor bush fire management and climate variability and change. Indirect drivers include population growth, land conflicts and insecurity.
To address the problem of land degradation, Cameroon committed to the AFR100 initiative in 2017, to restore more than 12 million hectares of deforested and degraded landscapes across the country by 2030.
Cameroon has defined its voluntary national Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) targets as part of its IUCN-supported project to define LDN targets for GEF-6. Cameroon has made an international commitment to the UNCCD to achieve a gain of one million hectares of productive land, with no loss of productive land.
Several barriers need to be overcome to advance LDN in Cameroon and specifically in the North and Far North Regions. These barriers include: i) limited experience in defining, implementing and monitoring LDN objectives at local level; ii) lack of participatory land-use plans; iii) insecure access to land and low adoption of Sustainable Land Management (SLM) practices by smallholders. Users' insecure access to land and lack of ownership discourage long-term improvements in land management practices. Private ownership of land is very rare in the North and Far North. Most land is legally owned by the government and citizens are allowed to use it according to traditional land use and access arrangements. Agroecological SLM practices compete with chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides. When it comes to improving soil fertility for crop production and reducing crop diseases, farmers essentially have a choice between two approaches: (1) agroecological SLM practices or (2) the use of chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides. Knowledge and lack of information and training resources about SLM practices are limited; iv) lack of awareness of the need to take environmental and climate change aspects into account in agricultural production in general and rice and onion production in particular.