Gorongosa Restoration Project

Gorongosa Restoration Project (GRP) is a not-for-profit organization with a US office and a registered office in Mozambique. In Mozambique there is an Oversight Committee and four main departments: • Conservation • Community Relations • Operations and Infrastructure • Scientific Services

GRP is working with the Government of Mozambique’s Ministry of Tourism on a conservation and ecotourism project in Sofala Province within central Mozambique. In 2008, the GRP signed a twenty-year agreement with the Government of Mozambique to restore Gorongosa National Park (the Park). As part of this effort, the GRP is establishing an ecotourism project that will work closely with – and benefit – the fifteen buffer zone communities that surround the Park. In addition to other activities such as conservation agriculture, and improvement of livelihoods at large, this project will involve providing health care and education to these communities.

Gorongosa National Park was once a prime international tourist attraction. However, the Park was decimated in a civil war. As a result, both its ecosystem and the local communities are in dire need of assistance and care. Human activities in and around the Park, such as illegal poaching and uncontrolled fires, threaten the sustainability of the ecosystem. Outside the Park, lives hang in the balance due to a dearth of health care and health services for the thousands of residents in the buffer zone who live in extreme poverty and isolation. The GRP recognizes that these residents are the most important caretakers of the ecosystem; the future of the Park is inextricably tied to the health and wellbeing of these local communities.

GRP receives funding from the Carr Foundation, from USAID, IPAD (in Portugal) and other donors.