The workshop held in Nature Park Tikvara

Parks Dinarides organized the first, among many workshops, within a second round of Indexation – assessment of local communities’ involvement in the management of protected areas, inNature Park Tikvara in Vojvodina. Inhabitants of this protected area gave their opinions on the cooperation with management bodies in the area of planning and management in the park, education, communication, and on the activities significant for social and economic development of the park and equal opportunities for the usage of natural resources in the area.

The event has been goverened by the representatives of the Institute for Nature Conservation of Vojvodina Province and Parks Dinarides, whereas the opportunity to give their oppinion on the cooperation with park management was provided to fifteen representatives of citizens, local institutions and organizations: Municipalities Bačka Palanka, local community office “Dunav”, Institutions for sport and recreation “Tikvara”, local organizations dealing with children and youth “Humana”, Nautical Club “Tikvara”, Kayak – canoe club “Tarket”, Association of small animal breeders “Golub” (eng: Pidgeon), etc.

“In order to protect natural values and improve the management of the park, we have implemented a project Establishing a forum of stakeholders of Nature Park Tikvara and Municipality of Bačka Palanka, with the support of Parks Dinarides. Through this unit we have gathered interested users of the area, that will be able to participate in planning and implementation of our activities in an organized manner – Darko Božović, a direktor of the Institution for Sport and Recreation “Tikvara” said.

The participants indicated a significant progress in cooperation, and underlined that further steps need to be taken, especially in the area of educating about the values of the park, protection measures, as well as possibilities for tourism valorization. Also, it has been concluded that the protection of the area is obstructed by insufficiently straightforward legal procedure, and that the local community shall be involved to a greater extent into the regulation adoption procedures significant for the activities within the park, so that the solutions are clear and implementable on field.

 “We have conducted several meetings and lectures with your colleagues, hence we are familiar with the fact that Tikvara represents a protected area of third category and what are the activities that are implementable and allowed in this area. We used to believe that no activities were allowed in the park due to the protection. The three of us have learned a lot, the issue is now how to transfer the knowledge to other members of the club.”, one of the participants indicated.

Nature park Tikvara is dedicated to protection of nature, as well as to valorization of the lake and other natural resources through sustainable development of sport, recreation and tourism.

 “We do our best to make our resources available to all the citizens, by valorizing the area around the lake of Tikvara through developing locations for recreation and setting up many sport terrains, available free of charge to citizens. It has been rewarding for us in multiple ways, since Bačka Palanka has provided for twelve superb athletes so far – participants at the Olympic games”, Božović, a director of the Institution for Sport and Recreation “Tikvara” added.

The INDEXATION is the initiative initiated by Parks Dinarides in cooperation with WWF Adria, within a Programme “Protected Areas for Nature and People” (PA4NP). It has been a unique instrument for measuring and enhancement of the involvement of local communities in the management of protected areas. Methodology is based on gathering the data on how protected areas and the representatives of local communities evaluate the existing mutual cooperation, whereas the achieved results serve to develop recommendations and implement new initiatives, such as the Grant Programe for Protected Areas, where the Institution for Sport and Recreation Tikvara is one of the beneficiaries of the grant.

So far, more than 1000 people from protected areas of Dinarides gave their opinions through indexation workshops.

Further information on INDEXATION available at:  http://parksdinarides.org/me/projekti/indeksacija_procjena_i_unapredenje_ukljucenosti_lokalnih_zajednica_u_upravljanje_zasticenim_podrucjima