Case study of the Mgahinga and Bwindi Impenetrable Forest Conservation Trust

Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable and Mgahinga Gorilla national parks are home to 300 endangered
mountain gorillas (Gorilla gorilla berengi) and to significant biodiversity. That habitat was once seriously threatened by economic exploitation, but now enjoys local-level conservation support. This results from a concerted effort to enhance the local economy, while demonstrating how biodiversity conservation factors into the socio-economic development equation.
In 1991 the Government of Uganda changed the status of Mgahinga and Bwindi from forest reserves to national parks, giving them greater protective status. Done with no consultation with local communities, the action led to loss of local resource access, anger and resentment; all of which turned into opposition to the national park and its managers. Local people suddenly suffered a change in status from lega resource users to illegal poachers and responded with disregard for newly established rules. National and international concern over encroachment and threats to the gorilla habitat led to development of strategies that included greater park protection, ecotourism based on gorilla visitation and support for more sustainable economic development in local communities. Interest in the latter fostered exploration of sustainable financing options to address long-term conservation and development challenges. The World Bank and GEF prescription was the creation of an endowed conservation trust fund that would invest in conservation-related projects in and around the two national parks. Thus was born the Mgahinga and Bwindi Impenetrable Forest Conservation Trust (MBIFCT), the first GEF supported trust fund in Africa.