Community members in Pyapon township in the Ayeyarwady region of Myanmar are successfully leading an association focused on conserving natural resources and promoting sustainable local development.
In December 2022, a group including youth and older residents came together to establish the Green Environment Development Association (GEDA) and agreed on its objectives, structure and functions. In June 2023, GEDA received legal status.
Currently, GEDA is engaged in mangrove forest and biodiversity conservation, community development activities and climate change initiatives in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund, the Myanmar Environment Rehabilitation-conservation Network and RECOFTC Myanmar.
“Sustainable development in forest landscapes depends on action that is rooted in and accountable to local communities,” says U Thein Saung, Chairperson of GEDA. “The training that RECOFTC provided a decade ago gave our founder members the insights and skills needed to play this important role.”
The founders were inspired to set up the association after participating in two capacity-building projects that RECOFTC Myanmar ran in the 2010s. These projects focused respectively on community forestry and on REDD+. The trainings covered livelihood improvement, institutional strengthening, conflict management, development of forest management plans, leadership and financial management.