Livelihoods and Economic Development
One overarching threat to biodiversity and civil strength in PNG is the over-extraction, exploitation of natural resources, lack of land use planning, and lack of management of the critical natural-resource base for economic enrichment. The resulting damage and loss of biodiversity (due to habitat loss and degradation of ecosystem functions) will directly impact PNG’s people—over 80% of whom live in rural or remote areas. To address this, LGP and WGDP both have work streams that address development and strengthening of naturebased livelihoods within the focusgeographies and proposed conservation areas. LGP’s role will be to verify and monitor the environmental sustainability of introduced livelihoods (i.e., is a plant used for weaving abundant, harvested without impacting its role in the ecosystem, and
replaced/replanted properly?) and, as with gender equity, to integrate the livelihood activities into the overall land- and biodiversity management practices in conservation zones. W-GDP will strengthen and enhance women’s participation in and benefit from sustainable livelihoods and land management through expanded
opportunities, and increase their access to start-up funding and business development mentoring.
