By Lucas Meers | Program Officer
The agroforestry program continues to be successful with more and more farmers wanting to be a part of the program. The increased crop yields lessens the need to expand their farming plots farther into the forest and away from their homes making the program appealing and beneficial to all who participate.
By teaching the basic techniques of crop rotation, how to incorporate nitrogen-fixing trees and the utilization of natural fertilizers shows OCP’s investment in the community and helps build trusting relationships with everyone involved. And by providing food security to impoverished the communities, it reduces their encroachment into critical okapi habitat for access to additional space to grow crops to support their families.
As funding becomes available, we are hoping to expand into Mungbere and Niania, providing a greater area of coverage around the Reserve.
So far in 2016, OCP has built 11 new nurseries providing seedlings for reforestation projects around the Reserve. Since the last update, over 10,000 seedlings have been distributed to help rebuild vital okapi habitat around schools within the Reserve. Involving children in this process helps instill the value on wildlife conservation at a young age.
Without our champions and supporters like you, we would not be able to bring this exciting program to communities around the Reserve and help instill the value of wildlife conservation into the youth of communities sharing a home with the okapi.
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