Forest Restoration with Locally Important Species (FORLIS):
Tribal or indigenous people have a deep cultural tradition of conserving natural forest near the village settlement area for various reasons. In Rongmei, it is called “Rambou”. However, there is a decline in cultural practices due to aggravating external factors. After several rounds of consultation and discussion with the Tribal elders and leaders, RNBA came up with an idea of forest restoration along the concept of Rambou by regenerating locally important species like agar, Canarium strictum Roxb, sugandh mantri, tree bean, cane & bamboo, wild fruits and vegetables where income, nutrition (food basket), ecosystem services, biodiversity conservation is enhanced while natural forest cover is conserved. For instance, Canarium strictum Roxb, known by common names including black dhup, Raal, Raaldhup and black dammar, a tree species where its resin are collected. Traditionally people collect resins from few trees in natural forest where one can generate Rs. 30,000 – 40,000/year/plant. Since these are not foreign species which could bring changes to the ecosystem, the idea came up “If we can regenerate 1000 plants of locally important species with high economic worth, we collect only the resins from the trees, forest will remains intact, and income will enhance, let’s do it…”. That’s how we decided to take up the idea of FORLIS. This model also aims at promoting ecopreneurs among the youth.
Sloping Agricultural Land Technology (SALT)
Sloping Agricultural Land Technology (SALT) is a sustainable alternative for sloping land agricultural systems like jhum/shifting cultivation. It is also known as Contour Hedgerow Intercropping (Agroforestry) Technology (CHIAT), is a system in which dense hedgerows of fast growing perennial nitrogen-fixing tree or shrub species are planted along contour lines thus creating a living barrier that traps sediments and gradually transforms the sloping land to terraced land. The nitrogen-fixing hedgerows lining the terrace help improve soil fertility through nitrogen fixation at the roots and incorporation of the hedgerow trimmings into the soil. The hedgerows both markedly reduce soil erosion and contribute to improving and/or maintaining soil fertility. The technology was developed by the Mindanao Baptist Rural Life Centre, internationally known by the name of its sister affiliate Asian Rural Life Development Foundation (ARLDF), on a marginal site in Kinua Kusan, Mindanao Island, Philippines.
RNBA adopted the model in the 2000 & 2001 at Siangai (Perengba) supported by Canada High Commission, however, due to many reasons the model was dropped and the communities continued jhum/shifting cultivation. RNBA conducted assessment and evaluation for a project supported by BftW by Mr. David Gandhi. With his expertise, he identified gaps, developed a context-specific model for Northeast India and promoted SALT in Aben. RNBA is scaling up the model to other areas of Manipur hill districts.
Land Tenure Certificate (LTC)
The land in the hill is not documented and is purely under customary regime. There are no legal framework and legal institutions around land in the hills. When and if issues around land arise they are addressed in the customary court. The law of the land changes from village to village and from one governing authority to another. Hence, the customary land tenure system in Manipur and northeast is quite diverse and complex. As a result codification of customary land tenure system is not possible at a state or regional level.
There is a need to address land related conflicts and land tenure security for all. With increasing insecurities around land and its use, intra-village conflicts may rise. Land Tenure Certificate is a framework where land can be documented and a record can be developed as per the existing diverse customary land tenure systems. We do this by building trust with the local authorities; consent of every household and by using modern technologies like GPS/GIS. We ensure that even women of the household are included in the land tenure documentation thus securing them in the absence of their husband/father. Thus we have developed a framework where security can be introduced to customary land tenure system of Tribal people in Manipur and Northeast India.
We foresee that the land records will also be a document of evidence for the communities to solve land related conflicts.
Reviving Government School
The idea of reviving government schools was seeded in 2013 since the personal involvement of Executive Director, Dimgonglung Rongmei in his native village, Taodaijang. For the Taodaijang Jr. H/S in Bwanruangh Taudaizaeng, Nungba, Noney, Manipur, he initiated public consultation with all villagers & DI of Tamenglong ZEO office. Villagers also organised separate emergency general meeting on the matter of reviving government school where he insisted that all children of the village must stay back to study in the public school. By 2014, the school revived with 80% of the village children attending the school.
Some significant value addition were that local institutions contributed both in monetary and service like cleaning the school campus done by women society; providing refreshments for the faculty and; village authority and SMDC were responsible and held accountable for the overall functioning of the school. The idea is to involve all key stakeholders of the village and collectively revive government school. It was evident that government school can be revived with active involvement of the community members.