Sustainable Forest Management in Africa

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1.Lessons Learnt on Sustainable Forest Management in Africa

DR. J. ODERA,National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya, July 2004

The search for sustainable methods of land use goes back to the 1950s when planned community development thrusts were introduced but later abandoned in the 1960s. In the late 1960s to early 1970s the concept of equity and participation re-emerged, to be buttressed a little later by the concept and approaches based on integrated rural development projects. This period was also dominated by campaigns to avert an impending fuelwood crisis in Africa. These projects promoted tree planting on-farm and reforestation of degraded community forests on hilltops and areas of low agricultural potential. In response to the outcry over the loss of tropical forests in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), many countries,with donor support, attempted in the 1970s and 1980s to bring more forests under state tenure and protection, and urged farmers to plant trees in their farms to relieve pressure from natural forests. Rural development initiatives focused on decentralisation, following recognition that centralised forest regimes, which exclude local knowledge and customary practices, were not achieving sustainable forest management. During this time, the heightened concern about energy supplies, following the energy crisis in
1973, created an awareness of developing countries’ dependence on wood for cooking and other household needs. Increased investments were directed to development of improved charcoal and cooking stoves. Forest plantation programmes were intensified in many countries during this period, normally with donor
support.

http://www.ksla.se/sv/retrieve_file.asp?n=745

2.Conservation and sustainable management of tropical moist forest
ecosystems in Central Africa.
Case study of exemplary forest management in Central Africa: Community forest management at the Kilum-Ijim
mountain forest region Cameroon

Because of the important role of the Kilum-Ijim Forest in local economy and culture, forest conservation, to be successful, must involve local people and address their needs. Recognising this, MINEF and the project agreed to shelf the original plans to gazette thewhole forest and work towards the establishment of community forests covering most of the Kilum-Ijim Forest, with a core gazetted conservation area at the center of the forest (Plant life Sanctuary). This was made possible by the new Forestry law of 1994, which allowed for the establishment of legally recognized community forests, in which management of a forest can be devolved to the communities bordering the forest, on the basis of an agreed forest management plan.

Thus, since 1994, the project has been working with communities
surrounding the forest for the establishment of legally recognized community forests that will cover most of the Kilum-Ijim Forest. During the previous phase of the project, which ran from July 1995 to June 2000, project efforts were focused on assisting Forest Management
Institutions established by the forest-adjacent communities to go through the legal steps needed for the legal attribution of their community forests. A crucial part of the process involved negotiation of forest use limits based on MINEF conservation objectives for the
forest and local use objectives by the communities around the forest. On this basis, the project facilitated a meeting bringing together Divisional MINEF staff, traditional authorities and community representatives from all three fondoms in which forest-wide rules were agreed. All simple management plans for the individual community forests would take into consideration these rules. Currently, the project is in its final (winding down) phase, which is expected to end in June 2004.

ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/008/ae731e/ae731e.pdf




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