All legacy landscape programs are structured in five-year milestone periods. Every 5 years, milestone reviews are carried out to assess the program’s progress and impact. It is a key component of adaptive program management and intended to shape a dialogue between LLF and its grantee on program implementation’s successes and challenges, new risks and opportunities as well as necessary changes and adjustments.
Methodology
The milestone review for the Iona landscape was carried out by Diogo Ferreira and Ana Nuno and took place between July and December 2025, including a field visit in October. The milestone review followed a two-step approach: this includes a self-assessment by the grantee, followed by an independent review of cross-portfolio and site-specific issues for Iona by the LLF-contracted consultants. Communities including Indigenous Peoples and more than 30 individual stakeholders have been consulted, including members of local administration, park staff, community representatives, and other partners (consultants, university).
Main Findings
The review argues that some major achievements were made during the first five years of program implementation, e.g. the creation of a fully functional park management system, the establishment of core departments and clear standard operation procedures and protocols. Also highlighted are functioning systems for capacity-building, monitoring, reporting, and adaptive management. According to the review, meaningful opportunities for communities including employment, vocational growth, support to school education, and initial steps towards value chains have been created but are still at the early stages and not yet at scale.
The milestone review also reveals challenges that merit further attention, such as delays in the development of key processes intended to safeguard rights and resource access of Indigenous Peoples, including further developing and implementing a Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) Protocol and the Indigenous Peoples Plan (IPP). A finalization and reinforcement of these processes will contribute to the quality of engagement and the ability to mitigate risks for key stakeholders and program implementation.
While the community department has strong local acceptance, it will be important to match community expectations for income security, benefit sharing, human-wildlife conflict mitigation and resource access soon.
Lastly, political challenges in the co-management set-up prevail and will have to be solved in the short term to ensure conservation successes and financial sustainability of the park.
Key Recommendations
The consultants recommend to urgently complete and operationalize core safeguard instruments, including/specifically a robust community development strategy aligned with a stakeholder engagement plan and the land-use plan to address use rights, income security, and benefit sharing. The consultants also emphasize the need to strengthen the grievance mechanism through culturally sensitive, low-barrier channels. In addition, livelihood and value-chain initiatives — including tourism — should be expanded to generate broader socio-economic benefits through a strengthened engagement with Indigenous communities and the National Biodiversity and Protected Areas Institute (INBAC). Internally, capacity should be enhanced through stronger interdepartmental coordination and targeted staff development.
The implementation of recommendations and action points resulting from the milestone review process is monitored by LLF through its reporting framework.
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