Landscape Management Planning and Training for the Environment in South Sudan (LAMPTESS)

Landscape Management Planning and Training for the Environment in South Sudan (LAMPTESS) (2011-2015)

Partners

University of Helsinki, VITRI
Upper Nile University, University of Juba, and MAF (Government of South Sudan) Directorate of Forestry as a sub‐partner

VITRI team

Prof. emer. Olavi Luukkanen – Project Leader
Dr. Jörn Laxén -Project Coordinator-
Dr. Loice Omoro
Mr. Biar Deng
Mr. Emil Yan
Several staff members of UNU and UoJ in South Sudan

Financing

The Higher Education Institutions Institutional Cooperation Instrument HEI-ICI (Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland)

Background

The LAMPTESS Project started in May 2008 and ran to March 2010 under another funding program of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, which supported capacity building between one northern and one southern state organisation between VITRI of the University of Helsinki and the GoSS MAF/ Directorate of Forestry. Two southern Sudanese Universities of Upper Nile and Juba involved as sub‐partners already in this first phase. The project was thereafter to continue under another financing program, the actual start‐up of the HEI‐ICI Program was substantially delayed and LAMPTESS continued in 2010 as a micro‐project supporting the project’s demofarm operations in Renk. In May 2011 the LAMPTESS project started up again, but this time the southern Sudanese partners were on the brink of becoming South Sudanese partners after the declaration of independence from Sudan on 9th July, 2011.

The current main South Sudanese partners are the Upper Nile University/ Faculties of Foresty and Range Sciences and Agriculture; and the University of Juba/ College of Natural Resources and Environmental Studies, while the RoSS Directorate of Forestry is a sub‐partner to LAMPTESS. The Finnish partner, Viikki Tropical Resources Institute of University of Helsinki (VITRI) has about 30 years of experience from Sudan in various pragmatic development cooperation and research projects that have, over these years, been financed by several financiers. VITRI is an expert organisation specialised, among other things, in land and vegetation rehabilitation on drylands (particularly agroforestry) requiring multi‐disciplinary approaches such as social, ecological, environmental, and economic considerations for its implementation.

Project purpose

To build up capacity at the Faculties of Forestry and Range Sciences as well as Agriculture at Upper Nile University (UNU) and at the Centre of Natural Resources Management and Environmental Studies at University of Juba (UJ) in order to deliver a decisive contribution to the improvement of Southern Sudanese natural resources management and rural development through better education of graduates, taking a direct leading role in rural development and in finding new solutions to increasing climate change challenges.

Focus of activities

For efficient implementation of the Partner institutions’ tasks, the LAMPTESS project provide some interventions for strengthening of the key stakeholder institutions which also incorporate some pilot communities. The planned interventions focus mainly on three elements:

  • Human capacity building which refers to training of individuals;
  • Institutional capacity building that is intended to foster an enabling environment for enhancing implementation of various rural development practices and concepts with the aim of acting as a model for South Sudanese rural areas; and
  • Substantial field operations together with various stakeholders in order to develop permanent dialogues and joint practical planning models for rural development practices for the future.

The current phase of the LAMPTESS Project started in May 2011 and is ending in December 2012 after which it is likely to continue with another two years (current anticipation).

For UNU and other stakeholders in Renk County the main activities include the following operations.

  • Various upgrading of educational capacity and other institutional building at UNU in Renk;
  • Demonstration of farm operations and research capacity support for UNU in Renk County;
  • Re‐starting of extension services in the main project area of Renk County, including a fairly comprehensive Landscape Management Plan (LMP) for this area and outline GIS maps for the whole of the county;
  • Support for the establishment of a new large‐scale central nursery (500,000 seedlings) and two community forest nurseries;
  • Community forest lands established in Renk County as well as substantial out‐planting of tree seedlings on state lands.

At UJ/CNRES in Juba the main activities include the following operations:

  • Educational capacity and other institutional building at UoJ in Juba;
  • A training course on rural development practices, international forest policies, and forest business management;
  • Continuous ,monitoring of the forest and environmental situation in Southern Sudan;