Wonegizi.

The Wonegizi Mountains form a transboundary conservation corridor between Liberia and the Republic of Guinea, and include the Wonegizi proposed Protect area. The Wonegizi area is recognized internationally a key biodiversity conservation hotspot and covers 37,979 hectares located in Ziama clan, comprising 20 towns and 47 satellite villages with an estimated population of 40,000 people. SADS has seven years strong working relation with communities around Wonegizi that is build around trust and mutual respect. SADS work has focus on promoting environmental conservation, sustainable forest management and alternative livelihood provision, as means of generating incomes to support their life style. The just ended project funded by the Rufford Small Grant Foundation enable SADS to jump start the environmental rights and education training program amongst youth and teachers in three communities schools. As a result, SADS intend to continue and replicate this program into seven new communities, while maintaining presence in previous three communities in Ziama Clan. SADS will ensure that results and lessons learnt from previous work will be use to improve training program in achieving its long- term objective of empowering youth to serve as major engine for reducing threats and pressure on the forest.

The Wonegizi youth environmental rights and education program will be expanded in seven additional forest dependent communities, while maintaining presence in the three previous communities. This program has set the stage and platform for the exchange of ideas and information on environmental issues related to the Wonegizi forest, in addition to other environmental activities relevance in Liberia amongst rural youths and students. This has raise public awareness and lays the framework for informed youth engagement. This program will ensure that rural youth and students are recognized and given the tools to exercise their rights to participate in decision making process, as well solution finding to resolve environmental problems at community and national level. This project aim to promote environmental rights education and training program amongst rural youths and students in order to increase their Knowledge, Change Altitude and Practices regarding the conservation and protection of their environment.

This program will serve as a well-organized environmental awareness and education engine to achieve the followings:

Provide continuous technical and logistical supports to the established three youth environmental rights and nature clubs,

Organized youth environmental rights awareness and education program seven rural communities;

Facilitate the establishment of seven youth environmental rights and education nature clubs in seven communities schools

Trained and established seven Environmental Education Team in each targeted seven project communities;

Increased the knowledge altitude and practice of rural youth concerning best forestry and environmental practices in their respective communities;

Facilitate the inclusion of environmental education program into rural school curriculum in ten schools;

Trained seven master trainers to play an advisory and coordinating role in implementing the educational modules in schools and communities;Provide logistical supports to ten youth environmental rights and education nature clubs in seven community’s schools.

The major activities of this project are as follows:

1. Establishment of Wonegizi Environmental Nature Club: SADS will facilitate the continue establishment of seven (7) environmental nature clubs in seven (7) communities in Ziama clan. These club memberships will specifically focus on rural youths especially those whose activities threaten the Wonegizi proposed protected forest. These nature clubs will use several medium like campus and community peer group lecture series, multi- media (video show) information sharing and posters publicity for informing and educating other young people. These clubs will be encouraged to network and collaborate with established environmental club.

2. Production of environmental education teaching aids materials: SADS will produce additional teaching aid materials (i.e. posters, stickers, banners and picture booklets) covering environmental conservation topics, and will be distributed to target beneficiary audiences and other natural resource user groups during teaching sessions. SADS will ensure that the subject matter in the teaching materials overlaps with topics written in the environmental education program to ensure maximum opportunity for learning and reinforcement of information provided.

3. Identify and Train Environmental Education Team (EET): SADS, in consultation with each targeted school administration, will identified one science teacher and five clubs members to constitute the environmental education team. The selected teachers will be provided subsistence allowances to compensate and encourage their full leadership commitment in coordinating clubs activities.