On the 12th of June 2022 (Sunday), Nature Conservation Management (NACOM) organized an inception meeting on the Development of Operational Phase 7 (OP7) SGP Bangladesh Country Programme Strategy at the Department of Environment (DoE). The Small Grants Programme (SGP) supported by the GlobalEnvironment Facility (GEF), implemented by UNDP following Direct Implementation Modality (DIM), and executed by United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) provides civil society and community-based organizations (CSOs/CBOs) in developing countries with grants to enable them to tackle global environmental challenges while addressing local sustainable development needs.
SGP has completed operations in over 127 countries for over 30 decades. The 7th Operational Phase of the SGP aims “to promote and support innovative, inclusive and scalable initiatives, and foster multi-stakeholder partnerships at the local level to tackle global environmental issues in priority landscapes and seascapes.” A key element of SGP’s implementation in OP7 is to develop landscape/seascape approaches within countries to better focus grant-making and promote strategic programming and clustering of small grant projects to achieve more significant impact and lead to synergies and opportunities for scaling up.
National Steering Committee(NSC) Chairperson Zakia Afroz, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change(MoEFCC), Government of Bangladesh was present in the meeting along with NSC member Dr. Mariam Akhtar, Assistant Chief Conservator of Forest (Planning), Bangladesh Forest Department, Dr. S.M Atikullah, Freelance Consultant, Independent Consultant, Mr. Md. Abu Nashir Khan, Assistant General Manager, (Environment and Climate Change), Palli Karma Sahayak Foundation (PKSF), Ms. Rumana Binte Masud, Government, Public Relation Coordinator, Friendship Bangladesh, Lutfor Rahman, Executive Director, Greentech Foundation, Bangladesh, Arif M. Faisal, Programme Specialist (Nature, Climate and Energy), UNDP Bangladesh and Mohammed Muzammel Hoque, National Coordinator, GEF Small Grants Programme.
Executive Director of NACOM S M Munjurul Hannan Khan gave his thoughtful views during his presentation. He mentioned that Bangladesh is going to implement the GEF SGP program for the first time.
At the end of the meeting, the core team agreed on the landscapes with the help of the expert’s opinion. The landscape of SGP OP7 Country Strategy Programme Bangladesh includes Cox’s Bazar, Teknaf, and Haor areas. SGP will provide a $50000 grant to CBOs and CSOs in the following thematic areas: Community-led Ecosystem Conservation and Restoration, Community-led Rare/Endangered/Threatened Species (Floral/Faunal) Conservation, Community-based Sustainable Forest/Land Management, Community-based Wetland Resources Management (Fresh water and marine), Promotion of Community-based Ecotourism, Promotion of Circular Economy and Sustainable Consumption and many more.