Activities within the grant and expected impact:
The project aims to promote mithun rearing in the community forest as an incentive to conserve the forest, since mithuns thrive best in thick forests. To venture into this innovative, community- led conservation of forests through mithun rearing with the dual purpose of conservation and livelihood promotion, a weather-beaten fence of four-tier barbed wire using concrete and lasting pillars to protect the mithuns from invading and foraging into paddy fields, orchards, gardens and jhum fields is being proposed. The site that is being proposed for conservation covers a total circumference of 20 kilometres under community-owned land, at an altitude of about 1,500—2,000 meters above sea level. The proposed site also serves as a watershed for a number of neighbouring villages, where many small perennial mountain streams originate and is the source of irrigation for a number of villages downstream, including Thetsumi, Tsufpume, Chizami, Enhulumi and Mesulumi. The proposed area will be subsequently treated as protected forest area enabling at least 200 families in the long term to rear mithuns for enhanced livelihood, whilst also converting about 700 hectares of Jhum land into forest areas.

The objectives of the project are:

	To promote livelihoods of 50 farmers through rearing mithuns, thereby providing an additional income by about Rs12,000 to Rs20,000 per annum
	To conserve and protect community forests and facilitate regeneration of degraded forests
	To conserve and protect community forests and facilitate regeneration of degraded forests

The key activities entail:

	Conservation and protection of forests though erecting weather-beaten permanent fencing
	Construction of ponds and sheds
	Credit packet to purchase mithuns
	Ensuring community participation and engagement through workshops meetings and capacity building.