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Natural Products from the Land of Cedars
Al Shouf Cedar Society (Lebanon)
The Al Shouf Cedar Society (ACS) is the key organization responsible for managing Lebanon’s largest protected area, the Al Shouf Cedar Nature Reserve (SCNR).
As part of their management strategy, ACS has been working with local communities around the SCNR to promote the sustainable use of the reserve’s resources.
The Al Shouf Cedar Society (ACS) created its Rural Development Programme in 1999. The programme aims to improve local livelihoods around the Al Shouf Cedar Nature Reserve through the sustainable production and marketing of local products. Since its establishment, ACS has worked with local communities, particularly local women, beekeepers and shepherds, to develop a range of products that both reflect the area’s traditions and showcase what the reserve has to offer. ACS set up three workshop locations with state-of-the-art materials for ensuring high-quality products.
Furthermore, by working together they have standardised the quality, minimised the costs of manufacturing and, under the Al Shouf umbrella brand, achieved premium rates for their goods.
They are also currently working towards organic certification from LibanCert. All the natural products are sold in the reserve’s outlets as well as in authentic shops, hotel stores, trade fairs, exhibitions, etc.
The income from these products goes back to the local communities. This business approach to conservation first grew out of the need to get support from local stakeholders for the protected area.
When ACS first assumed responsibility for the reserve, the local stakeholders wanted it to be developed in such a way that would ultimately lead to its destruction. Conservation was still an alien concept in Lebanon, and both local communities and the region’s authorities believed that the best solution for improving local livelihoods was to develop the area for mass tourism.
However, through the Rural Development Programme and small-scale tourism development, ACS demonstrated that there was a more sustainable way to achieve the same goals.
One of the key outcomes of this work has been a change in local attitudes towards conservation and increased support for the protected area.
This change has not only been observed in local communities but also through increased support from the local authorities.
Additionally, in 2003, ACS’s work was recognized internationally when UNESCO designated the wider area surrounding the Al Shouf Cedar Nature Reserve, including the Ammiq Wetland (one of the only remaining wetland sites in the Middle East as well as a Ramsar Site) and 24 local villages, as the Al Shouf Biosphere Reserve.
This important designation is given to areas where a balanced relationship between humans and nature is promoted and demonstrated.
For more information
Visit: www.shoufcedar.org
Contact: info@shoufcedar.org
Product Highlights
Approximately 70 different natural products have been developed to support rural development and conservation under the Al Shouf brand. These include:
Honey
Honey has been produced in Lebanon for many centuries, with evidence of honey production dating back to Phoenician times. Honey production is still an important livelihood in the Al Shouf area, where cedar honey is
the predominant variety due to the reserve’s healthy population of cedar trees. Cedar honey is considered a premium product, because of its unique flavour and rarity outside SCNR. ACS has been working with local communities in the reserve to improve the quality of the honey (and derivative products) and market these under the Al Shouf brand.
Maintaining this industry is not only important for preserving the area’s cultural heritage but also benefits conservation. Bees are an important vector for pollination and hence contribute to species diversity in the reserve.
Edible, aromatic and medicinal plants
A number of species of wild plants have been traditionally used by local communities in and around Al Shouf Biosphere Reserve for their special aromatic and medicinal properties. In an effort to conserve these species, preserve the communities’
cultural heritage and at the same time improve their livelihoods, ACS has been supporting the local communities in developing and commercializing products from these plants. They have also raised community awareness for the need to harvest these species in a sustainable way and helped set up nurseries to reduce the reliance on wild plants. Besides
selling the plants as they are, they have diversified their product range to include syrups and flavoured waters, including sage, rose-scented geranium, mint, mulberry, grenadine, rose and orange blossom syrups, and laurel, sage, nettle, orange flower, rose and mint waters.
Other products
A variety of other products are produced and sold from the reserve, including several jams and compotes (apple, apricot, fig and eggplant jams, and cherry, mulberry and peach compotes), dairy products, vinegars, pastes (grenadine, capsicum, tomato), pickles and grape and carob molasses.
http://cmsdata.iucn.org/
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