The DANONE Livelihood Fund creates social value for rural communities and contributes to their food security through the restoration of their ecosystems. The Sundarbans in the state of West Bengal is the largest single block of mangrove forest in the world and famous for the only tiger population living in a mangrove ecosystem. The fund supported a project of the Nature Environment and Wildlife Society (NEWS) which restored 6,000 hectares of mangrove greenbelts. The mangroves are located in the buffer zone of a nearby Ramsar site and are crucial for restoring fish populations which are the main source of income for the local population. The restoration work was financed through carbon credits. The DANONE Livelihood Fund contracted UNIQUE in consortium with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as a technical service provider.

• Project eligibility assessment incl. methodology selection, area mapping and legal due diligence.
• Development of the project description document.
• Mangrove growth and carbon modeling.
• Monitoring guideline development and monitoring capacity building.
• Project validation and management support.