"Green Coast helped me look at alternative sources of livelihood and helped me understand the importance of nature", says Satipathy, a local farmer in the Seyyankuppam village of Villipuram district of Tamil Nadu
Sathipathy switched to a relatively unknown method of rice cultivation - System of Rice Intensification - that has helped him increase yield with lesser inputs. Ekoventures, one of the NGOs that has been supported by Green Coast project's Small Grant Facility, worked with the communities and introduced SRI in the villages impacted by the Tsunami. To read more about the project, please visit the SGF pages.
Green Coast Project: An Introduction
The Green Coast project in India aims to work for the nature and people of the tsunami-affected areas by ensuring that livelihood development of the impacted communities is not at the expense of the environment. The Green Coast project is being implemented by three project partners: WWF-India, Wetlands International South Asia and Both ENDS-India.
Components of the Green Coast project
The project has three components:
First: assessment of the potential for ecological restoration to contribute to livelihood recovery.
Second: science-based policy and communications.
Third: a Small Grants Facility (SGF) to demonstrate the win-win solutions. These three components are inextricably linked and they will overlap during implementation.
Under this project, WWF-India is responsible for implementing the policy and communication component while Wetlands International South Asia will manage the impact assessment and the Small Grants Facility of the project.