The Community Park at the Vth WORLD PARKS CONGRESS 2003 8 – 17 September 2003 Durban, South Africa

Community Park

Introduction Community Park Daily Journal Community Park Photo Gallery Participant List Online Reading List Additional Links

Introduction

The Community Park will serve as a “Home Space” for local groups and will be hosted by community representatives, Indigeneous and mobile peoples, and local-level sustainable development practioners. It will provide the grassroots participants an opportunity to:

• Share experiences and concerns of sustaining their families and communities while also conserving protected areas
• Coordinate their participation in the seven official “streams” at the World Parks Congress
• Present their local initiatives and explore how other communities might learn from their experiences and apply them
• Asses how peer learning exchanges and other “community to protected areas” training processes can increase the effectiveness of community support to park management and ground locally based development networks with common objectives
• Interact with development professionals and government officials to discuss possible partnerships for supporting locally driven community development efforts for protected areas
• Receive media attention to highlight their victories achieved in an environment with adverse global and national political climates

The Community Park is supported by Conservation International, The Equator Initiative, IUCN, The Nature Conservancy, TILCEPA, GEF/UNDP Small Grants Programme, and UNDP.