Dikhu Green Zone

Sanctuary Asia (Vol XXXIII No. 3, June 2013) carries a report 'People for Parks' by Bittu Sahgal, Lakshmy Raman, Kritika Kapadia and Mallika Narvekar (Pages 61 - 65).

Placed within the report, in form of a box item, is a brief note on the Nagaland experience. 

The Dikhu Green Zone

In Nagaland, Community Conserved Areas (CCA) are helping to reduce hunting, forest degradation and provide valuable ecological services. CCA are natural or modified ecosystems that harbour significant biodiversity and have immense ecological and cultural value and are voluntarily protected by indigenous and local communities through customary laws or other effective means. The Nagaland Village and Area Councils Act, 1978, empowers village councils, autonomous local bodies for village administration to function according to customary practices and usages. 

Conservationists, Nimesh Ved and Swati Chaliha write: ‘The Dikhu river forms the boundary between Ungma and Longsa and a community initiative protects an approximately one kilometre area on either side of the river for the entire length (roughly 15 km.) that the river abuts the village lands in the Mokokchung district. Two organizations, The Nagaland Empowerment of People through Economic Development (NEPED) and Foundation for Ecological Security (FES) are helping the village council and Dikhu Green Zone (DGZ) Management prepare a management plan and build greater understanding among stakeholders towards sustainable conservation of the CCA. They helped them prepare a boundary map by recording ‘waypoints’, ‘tracks’ and marking important landmarks and species encountered. This was done to enable all the stakeholders to arrive at a common level of understanding on the CCA boundary.

The data generated was overlaid on a Google Earth image and put forth to the DGZ Committeee and Village Councils for ratification. Invigorating discussions at the meetings concerned nitty-gritties of the mapping process as also deliberations on inclusion and otherwise of select human altered patches within the CCA. Once the boundary was ratified, it was overlaid on layers of thematic maps with help of the Geographical Information Systems (GIS) team'.

A presentation on the action was a part of an event on CCA at the CEPA Fair during COP 11; Hyderabad (October 2012). 

PDF of the same can be accessed here.

Many thanks to NEPED, FES, people of Ungma and Longsa, DGZ, Sanctuary Asia, Laxmy Raman and Swati Chaliha.