Supporting Communities

The community development team has established a long working relationship with the local communities in the seven Gola chiefdoms surrounding the national park. One employee is assigned to cover each chiefdom, and that staff member is from that same chiefdom. As a result, the team has an extensive understanding of the community context and the individuals have developed a wide range of skills to engage local stakeholders. 

Since 2007, the community development team has been responsible for a wide range of livelihood interventions, ranging from infrastructure development to seed provision and agricultural processing improvements. Following clearly defined procedures, projects are put forward by communities and suitable ideas are developed into project proposals by a Gola Community Development Committee (GCDC) with support from GRC staff. 

Village Savings and Loans

The Village Savings and Loans Association (VSLA) programme is a microfinance initiative that is intended to provide basic, community-managed savings and loan facilities in communities that do not have easy access to financial services and at the same time increase financial literacy to the target communities. For each of the communities targeted capacity support is implemented over a period of 2 years to improve financial literacy. 

This program follows the assumption and rationale that enabling villagers to have access to a pot of funds that can be used to finance alternative livelihoods or used in times of emergency will provide improved and diversified incomes thus reducing pressure on forest resources whilst providing net positive benefits to forest edge communities. 

Environmental Education

Environmental awareness-raising and education scholarships complement livelihood activities and work towards empowering local communities to manage their natural resources sustainably. Since 2013 GRC has been supporting 39 Nature Clubs established in primary and secondary schools across the seven Gola chiefdoms. Each year GRC also award secondary school scholarships to cover school fees, uniforms, and materials for at least 1 male and 1 female student from each of the 122 forest edge communities.