The release of the crocodiles is part of the Community-based Crocodile Recovery and Livelihood Improvement Project, designed and implemented by WCS’s Lao PDR Program. ”The program has three key objectives,” WCS explained in its statement today, “contributing to local livelihoods by improving coordination of water resource use and zoning of lands used in local agriculture; conserving and restoring crocodile wetland habitat important for local livelihoods, crocodiles, and other species; and replenishing the crocodile population in the wetland complex and surveying and monitoring the current population.”

The program has worked with nine villages – each village has a “Village Crocodile Conservation Group” (VCCG) to coordinate implementation of program activities in the Xe Champone wetland complex and surrounding areas.