PUNE, India, Nov. 27, 2023 -- ECOBARI, a Collaborative by the Pune-based Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR), recently organised a special edition of 'Southbound Resilience Webinars.' The event aimed to shed light on the urgent need for Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) strategies in addressing climate change through the lens of biodiversity conservation.

The webinar successfully brought together key stakeholders from Academia, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), and Corporations. Dr. Erach Bharucha, a distinguished figure in environmental education and wildlife conservation in India with nearly 50 years of experience, moderated the panel discussions.

Describing the purpose of the webinar series Arjuna Srinidhi, National Anchor, ECOBARI, and Thematic Lead for Climate Change Adaptation at WOTR, said, "The phrase Southbound Resilience refers to the particularly challenging context of the global south in meeting development targets while also ensuring that we do that in a sustainable way. With this webinar series, we aim to learn on-ground experiences of practitioners, discuss issues with experts and foster collaboration for upscaling EbA in India and soon in the global south."

Distinguished participants in the webinar included Nitin Kakodkar and Subhash Bhadve, former officials from the Government of India's Forest Department, Dr. Kranti Yardi from Naoroji Godrej Centre For Plant Research, and researchers from WOTR Centre for Resilience Studies (W-CReS).

Bharucha said, "For me, this initiative resembles a startup and it is crucial to have think tanks like these in today's time. Climate change is going to go on for decades from now and all different types of stakeholders need to get involved to find solutions. Adaptation to climate change is living with climate change and if we have to live with climate change then we need to understand the types of ecosystems, their structures, functions, the composition of species, and so on."

Several practitioners presented interesting case studies at the event:

Krutika Ravishankar, Co-founder of the NGO Farmers for Forests (F4F), discussed a case study on the 'Forest and Carbon Credit Market.' She provided an overview of topics such as carbon credit, carbon farming, trading, and different types of carbon markets.

Amit Setiya, Founder of NGO CRANES, presented a case study on 'People's Participatory Nature Management' in 13-14 pilot villages of Gadchiroli, Maharashtra. The study focused on raising awareness about biodiversity and highlighted the challenges and opportunities associated with connecting participatory biodiversity conservation practices to income.

Sanjay Kumar, Country Head, and Anitha Chowdary, Research Manager at Valagro Biosciences Pvt. Ltd., covered two main areas in their study: access and benefit sharing, and transfer of research. Their research on microbial product development earned them the India Biodiversity Award 2021 from The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, recognising their contributions to this field.

About WOTR

WOTR is a globally recognised organisation dedicated to transforming the lives of millions of poor villagers across India through participatory watershed development and ecosystems restoration, climate resilient sustainable agriculture, integrated and efficient water management and climate change adaptation, with a special emphasis on building resilience of vulnerable communities, farmers, and women. WOTR was established in 1993 and is headquartered in Pune, Maharashtra, India. As of March 2021, WOTR, in collaboration with its partners, has worked in over 5,200 villages across 9 Indian states - Maharashtra, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Odisha. It has impacted more than 4.3 million people, trained over 530,000 people from across India and 63 countries and collaborated with 230 NGOs/Project Implementing Agencies (PIAs), and promoted over 15,500 SHGs involving 190,000 women.

About ECOBARI

A collaborative, ECOBARI brings together diverse stakeholders with a shared vision: empowering communities for a sustainable future employing the EbA approach. ECOBARI facilitates the joint action of committed individuals and institutions, representatives of Government, Civil Society Organisations, Businesses, Academia, NGOs, and Media to enable communities to conserve their local biodiversity, and restore and sustainably manage their natural resources aligned with the ecosystem they live in. ECOBARI's vision is to empower communities to sustainably regenerate and manage their ecosystems, conserve biodiversity, derive resilient incomes, and improve their quality of life through nature-based and nature-positive solutions, as they adapt to climate change.

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