The project “Strengthening adaptation capacities for communities close to the protected areas of Khosrov Forest State reserve and Dilijan National Park” is ongoing initiation to strengthen the communities' availability to adapt to climate change in Armenia. The project is financed by the Adaptation Fund and the implementer body is the Environmental Project Implementation Unit of the State Agency of the Ministry of Nature Protection of the Republic of Armenia (EPIU).
In Armenia, due to its climate and pronounced location in the South Caucasus with a mountainous landscape and fragile ecosystems, the compounding effects of climate change and land degradation substantially affect local economies and communities` livelihoods is particularly the case for the communities living next to the Khosrov Forest State Reserve (Ararat Marz, south-western Armenia) and Dilijan National Park (Tavush Marz, north-eastern Armenia). Both protected areas are highly important for species conservation. Several plants and animals on the Red List of Threatened Species of Armenia can be found here, including migratory species.
The communities surrounding these protected areas depend on limited land and pasture resources that are increasingly impacted by climate change. They are facing high rates of poverty with limited capabilities to address land degradation and sustainably manage the natural resources of the region. Community pastures are 3-9 km away from the villages, which are used by cattle breeders. Those pastures are severely degraded as continuous grazing from early spring to late autumn does not allow plants to undergo generative development and restore the area through seeds. There is a high risk that community pastures are transformed into unproductive landscapes thereby depriving rural mountain livelihoods. The lack of alternative income opportunities further weakens the adaptive capacity of their production systems.
Agriculture has traditionally been the backbone of Armenia’s rural economy, but agricultural productivity has decreased in the past five years. Meanwhile, between 2013 and 2020, at the national level, the share of the agricultural sector’s gross domestic product has gradually decreased from 18.4 percent to 11.7 percent. The decrease in harvesting for the rural populations adjacent to Khosrov Forest State Reserve and Dilijan National Park is mainly due to the lack of irrigation water and the efficiency of the deteriorated irrigation systems, where large water losses occur in irrigation channels. This is further aggravated by frequent hails, spring frosts, high summer temperatures, and hot winds in both areas.
The main objectives of this project are:
- to strengthen the community's climate adaptability and sustain the protected areas through promoting climate-smart agricultural practices in degraded areas
- to ensure gender equality and accessibility for vulnerable communities to the climate-smart technologies to add value chains for climate-smart agriculture
- to increase awareness, planning, monitoring, and decision-making capacity on climate-smart agriculture production methods and land degradation neutrality in target communities