Manipur: Senapati forest division launches community-led PRA drive to rejuvenate Barak watershed

In a major step towards ecological restoration and community-driven conservation, the Senapati Forest Division on Thursday, January 8 launched Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) exercises as a pilot initiative to rejuvenate the Barak River watershed while simultaneously strengthening local livelihoods.

The PRA exercise was conducted at Saranamai village in Senapati district, falling under the Barak catchment area. The initiative involved comprehensive community engagement to map natural resources, land-use patterns, wealth distribution, matrix rankings, village timelines, and a detailed SWOT analysis. The exercise aims to generate crucial baseline data that will guide the preparation of a detailed action plan under the new CAMPA scheme of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC).

Officials said the Senapati Forest Division plans to extend the PRA exercises to all villages within the Barak watershed in the coming days, ensuring a participatory and inclusive approach to river and forest management.

The Barak River, which originates at Liyai Khullen village in Senapati district, holds immense ecological, hydrological, environmental, socio-economic, and religious-cultural significance for the region. Flowing through Manipur, the river enters Assam’s plains and eventually drains into the Bay of Bengal as the Meghna River in Bangladesh. The Barak basin forms part of the greater Ganga–Brahmaputra river system and is the second-largest river basin in North-East India, with major tributaries including Makru, Irang, and Tuivai.

Despite its importance, the Barak basin and its catchment areas have come under increasing stress in recent years due to forest fires, floods, riverbank erosion, deforestation, shifting cultivation, soil erosion, landslides, and lack of awareness, officials noted. These threats have significantly undermined the ecological balance and socio-economic potential of the region.

Forest officials emphasised that addressing these challenges requires an integrated and multi-tiered forestry-led intervention, rooted in community participation and scientific planning. The PRA-based approach, they said, will play a crucial role in designing sustainable watershed rejuvenation strategies, improving forest cover, reducing land degradation, and enhancing livelihood opportunities for communities living along the Barak basin.