Landscape-scale Conservation of Endangered Tiger and Rhinoceros Populations in and Around Chitwan National Park

The project will promote landscape level biodiversity conservation with strong community-based management links to conserve endangered species in and around the Royal Chitwan National Park. This will be achieved by conserving and rehabilitating the only existing corridor forest (Barandhbar forest) linking the Royal Chitwan National Park, a World Heritage site in the lowland of Nepal, to ecologically significant upland forests in the Mahabharat range. Rural communities in Nepal rely heavily on natural resrouces for their livelihoods, so a strong socio-economic component is proposed to reduce the human impact in addressing ecological problems. This project will concentrate on the grass root level activities that address the needs of local people by pomoting biodiversity oriented economic incentives and generating guardianship for the wildlife and their habitat preservation. This project will adapt the Baghmara and Kumrose models of community-managed forests, which have proven to be successful in neutralizing the dependency of local people on forest resources and preventing habitat loss resulting from excessive utilization of resources.