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communities in revitalization of the conservation
traditions. There was a suggestion from Shri. Jairam
Ramesh, the Hon'ble Minister for Environment
and Forests, Govt of India while he was at
MSSRF-CAbC to set up Vana Vigyan Kendra
(Forest Resource Centre) for the purpose of
grooming the forest dwelling communities to
access sustainable livelihoods in various forest
related occupations, and enhance their knowledge
and skills in conservation, sustainability and
stewardship of forests. This can be achieved by
educating and training the local community men
and women in the fundamental concepts,
knowledge, and skills of forest and biodiversity
sciences. The experience from the study helped to
develop a proposal on this concept, which be
supported by the Ministry of MoEF. The project is
intended to start four such Vana Vigyan Kedras- 2
in Western Ghats and 2 in Eastern Ghats.
4.Promoting Responsible Commerce
This is essentially for building local economies and
for retaining benefits in the local area. An
opportunity in this regard is the trading option of
people in carbon credits because of the nonbinding
commitment of India to the Kyoto
protocol. Carbon credits of RET trees will be a
very significant commercial venture in creating an
economic stake in conservation. The sale of
carbon credits that largely leveraged on RET Trees
will be unique in the world where both
conservation of endangered species and
sequestering of carbon would achieve by a single
attempt. This attempt can help India to increase the
greenery of the country and volume of spot sales
in carbon trading as well as accrue the profit to
domestic project owners. Besides, there is a plan to
attempt on marketing plantation nurseries
of those high timber value RET trees by
organizing supply of quality planting
materials. The income generation
process by commercializing
products such as tree saplings and ecosystem
services without undermining the cultural values
can prove a major improvement option in the lives
of poorest in the intervention site of this project. It
is possible to mobilize the local communities to go
for larger scale planting of the RET trees of the
region.
5.Revitalisation of Cultural traditions
This research was intended to build an example of
concrete action to help people to keep alive the
local traditions of biodiversity conservation and
sustainable utilization. It may also contribute in the
discussions related to endogenous development.
Though the gender perspective on bio-cultural
diversity in different cultures is important, it had
not been attempted in the survey. The
communities, I have worked are those who have
vital traditions, and diversity in culture, ethnicity
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