" community is much more than belonging to something; it's about doing something together that makes belonging matter"
During 2015, we put some emphasis on the relationship between CSOs and communities, supporting CSOs to look critically at themselves and how they include and account to the communities they work with.
We supported our clients in our countries of intervention to build and strengthen spaces for community participation, and to incorporate the views of its members when planning their goals and activities.
Community ownership and participation is essential to have a real impact and to ensure sustainability.
2015 enabled Cameroon gender and environment watch (cAMGEW) to identify ways of engaging better with community members: They strengthened their community radio programme and initiated activities that gave them a space to get community views and challenges.
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2015 was also a year of change for Nature Cameroon. They focused on interventions that benefit the Banyang-Mbo constituency and initiated other participatory activities that have generated great engagement.
Community members are now much more involved in the protection of Banyang Mbo Wildlife Sanctuary that provides habitat to a large population of chimpanzees in this region and the last remaining sizeable population of forest elephants.
Brian Solis