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Forest and protected area management in Cameroon
... De plus, malgré la prise de conscience des impacts climatiques qui ne manqueront pas de retomber sur plusieurs secteurs, les changements climatiques et plus précisément l'adaptation à ceux-ci, ne figurent pas au premier rang des préoccupations de bon nombre de parties prenantes (Brown et al. 2010). De nombreux facteurs le mettent en évidence : l'insuffisance des données sur les solutions d'adaptation, la méconnaissance de l'adaptation parmi les parties prenantes et la population, la faiblesse des capacités du personnel dans les domaines de la planification, du suivi et de l' évaluation, l'absence de mécanismes de communication et de gestion des informations entre secteurs, l'inadaptation des capacités des institutions, le manque d'intérêt à faire appliquer la loi sur les forêts et l'absence de mesures incitatives favorisant cette application (Tieguhong et Ndoye 2007, Tieguhong et Betti 2008. ...
... The forestry laws are currently being implemented by MINFOW and the Ministry of Environment and Nature Protection (MINEP). The objectives of Cameroon's Forestry Law of 1994 and forest sector policies relating to biodiversity conservation and sustainable development considers the three main principles of sustainable use of forests as put forward by the convention on biological diversity (Tieguhong & Betti, 2008). In line with the objectives of Cameroon's forest code, the country has made commendable progress in sustainable forest management such as increasing the numbers of protected areas, community forests, council forests, and approved management plans for forest management units, as well as promoting multiple-use forest management for income and livelihood sustenance for local communities. ...
Sustainable forest management in Cameroon is being plagued with many challenges directly related to key issues in the areas of forest law enforcement and governance. This study used questionnaires to examine the major community livelihood activities undertaken in the SBFR causing deforestation and forest degradation and to explore the localized trigger forces, and their implications for sustainable forest management in Cameroon. The authors found that the rated localized forces triggering indiscriminate human activities in the Southern Bakundu Forest Reserve (SBFR) are scarcity of farmland outside the forest reserve land, population growth, poverty and the more fertile nature of the forest reserve land than the limited, overused, and degraded community farming land. In addition, the authors found that forest monitoring activities in the field by forestry officials were plagued with complicity by some corrupt forestry officials, forces of law and order, administration, local management committee leaders, and disgruntled local population in the apprehension of illegal forest exploiters, besides inadequate resources. The strategies to address the above issues have not been prioritized. Based on the results, this paper argues that the governance failure to prioritize more and better investment in modern agriculture, non-wood domestic cooking energy and reliable rural transport systems, amongst others, including building institutional capacity and physical infrastructure compromises sustainable forest management in Cameroon at both the national and local community levels. In this light, a set of holistic and comprehensive strategic programmes are recommended as the way forward to guaranteeing sustainable development in forest management in Cameroon.
... A zoning plan, aimed at demarcating forests into permanent and non-permanent domains, was also a major provision of these forestry reforms and, as Topa, Karsenty, Megevant, and Laurent (2009) note, this regulated access into these forest domains. This regulation therefore provided a robust foundation for potentially reducing deforestation and forest degradation in Cameroon (Tieguhong & Betti, 2008;Topa et al., 2009). ...
Cameroon has been a keen participant in Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation plus conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of carbon stocks (REDD+) negotiations since 2005 and has engaged in activities to enhance the implementation of REDD+. This article reviews progress on REDD+ readiness in Cameroon based on a multiple REDD+ functions framework. Results show that some progress has been made in terms of planning and coordination, institutional development, and the development of some REDD+ projects. Absence of a legal framework, inadequate procedures for stakeholder participation, slow progress in the development of a national strategy, monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) challenges, and weak financing remain prominent constraints. Despite having one of the slowest REDD Readiness Preparation Proposal (R-PP) processes in the Congo Basin, stakeholders feel strong ownership because the R-PP was done almost entirely by Cameroonian experts. Some opportunities for improving REDD+ can be considered going forward, including the establishment of procedures for a broader participatory process, speeding up the operationalization of the National Observatory on Climate Change, making use of the ongoing forestry law reform, consideration of a carbon concessions concept, tapping from international initiatives to build on MRV, and improving benefit sharing and financing through the development of an appropriate and decentralized mechanism. Enhancing these opportunities is fundamental for successful REDD+ implementation in Cameroon.
... Approximately 100 million people inhabit the region with an annual growth rate of about 2.5%, including more than 150 different indigenous groups (CBFP, 2010;WWF, 2007). Sixty-two percent of the total population live in rural areas in or around the forests (Ndoye and Tieguhong, 2004;Tieguhong, 2008). They directly depend on forest resources for food and nutrition, shelter and livelihoods, and during periods of crop failures due to climate variability or disease infestation, forests often act as a safety net for these rural people (MINEFI, 2006;Ndoye and Awono, 2005;Sassen and Jum, 2007). ...
The study assesses the contribution of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) in rural livelihoods and
the strategies for their conservation. A survey was conducted with 150 respondents in six villages of
the Bamboko Forest Reserve (BFR), using questionnaire, complemented by interviews, focus group
discussions, and direct field observations. The results showed that 10 key NTFPs of plant origin
and 13 animal species contributed to income generation, trade, employment, and household energy
in communities adjoining the BFR. In 2013, these communities generated an income of US$ 6,965
and US$ 3,603.8 per month from the sale of plant-based major NTFPs and ‘bush meat’ respectively,
contributing to the wellbeing of families. Unsustainable harvesting of NTFPs from the BFR have
resulted in 90% reduction in quantity collected, 83% decrease in income, as well as a purported 91%
degradation of the forest reserve. Indeed, over 90% of local population indicated significant decrease
in the quantity of NTFPs harvested and the number of animals hunted per month with consequential
decreases in incomes.
Cameroon’s Western Region is a beautiful, but small and most densely populated region in the country. The evolving environmental tensions building up in the region are little discussed, but a mixture of state economic policies or lack thereof, private sector business activities, and the broader economic activities have tended to condition life and tensions in the region. The region’s high population density and the small geographic space that forms the basis of economic activities for more than 90% of the population is turning the region into an emerging environmental bombshell waiting to explode. Yet, most of the environmental discussions and policies in Cameroon tend to focus more on the forest ecosystems of the country (in the greater South), the Northern Drylands, Parks, and Animal Reserves, and the polluted mega urban cities of Douala and Yaounde. I discuss the neglected environmental challenges of Cameroon’s grasslands ecosystem of the Western Region, the nature of the challenges, why there has been very little focus on it, what needs to be done and how to address them. (174)
Cameroon is a reference country in the Congo Basin in terms policy formulation and implementation to achieve sustainable forest management. However, many problems still exist in the field in relation to the control and management of forest operations as well as the gathering and analyzing of statistical data. The main objective of this study was to examine the status-quo of Assamela production and management in forest management units (FMUs) in order to inform policy makers on options towards sustainability. This study involved the review and analysis of literature from reports and the records of timber companies to identify the annual authorized volumes of Assamela, its production and residuals in the forest. Further analysis was conducted on multi-inventory data used in establishing management plans as well as data available at road and seaport checkpoints. Field checks and cross-checks on data were carried out in the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF) at the central, provincial, divisional, sub-divisional and local levels. The main results of the study showed that most authors of management plans for FMUs did not follow the same structure in writing management plans. This rendered data collation and analysis on concessions and their practices difficult. Where some data was supposed to be available, accessibility was difficult because of the dispersion and poor handling of hard copies of waybills, factory entry and output registers. Reports on the activities of community forests were not available and where available not consistent for statistical analysis. Electronic versions of most activity reports for present and past years were not available. The chief of service in charge of certification at MINFOF did not have access to statistical data on the volume of Assamela transformed per year. This put to question the reliability of the certification of timber from a Convention on international trade on endangered species of flora& fauna (CITES) listed species such as Assamela. Many problems were observed on the chain of control of timber products from the forest up to the exit ports at Douala. Even at the ports, accessibility is difficult for the forest officers who encounter many problems with custom agents. There was little linkage between the main databases (SIGIF and COMCAM) that gather statistical data on forest products. The main recommendations raised included the re-organization of the control and monitoring system as outlined in the Forest and Environment Sector Programme (PSFE), development of a database encompassing logging, processing, transportation and trade statistics components, the provision of adequate materials and logistics for data collection and analysis and the training and sensitization of forest and custom officers at different levels.
With the history and experiences of more than 100 years in formulation and revisions, since the British colonial period, the forest policy of Bangladesh has turned away from traditional production premises towards protection. Establishing protected areas for biodiversity conservation dates back to the 1960s. The strategy gained impetus with the passage of national legislation in 1973 that included provision of declaring forests as national parks, wildlife sanctuaries and game reserves for the protection of the natural forest resources. Due to the absence of clear demarcation between core areas and buffer zones and the absence of concern for the sustention of local communities’ usufruct rights, degradation continued in the protected areas. Therefore, an alternative strategy of co-management involving local stakeholders and provision of incentives in terms of Alternative Income Generation (AIG) supports; has been introduced by the government under a donor assisted project. This new policy is being implemented in five pilot sites. This co-management strategy has demonstrated positive impacts and, increasingly, is gaining recognition as appropriate for other protected areas. This paper reviews the evolutionary history of and periodical changes in the forest policy of Bangladesh—highlighting the conservation aspects, the development of protected areas and the gradual adoption of their collaborative management.
Climate change is one of the current global environmental challenges of great concern to the international community. Developing countries such as Cameroon will likely suffer most from its impacts partly because of high dependence on climate-sensitive natural resources such as forests and limited capacity to adapt to the changing climate. Cameroon’s forest ecosystem supplies goods and services for local livelihoods and national development. As climate change will have an undesirable impact on the functioning of the forest ecosystem, the livelihoods of the people that depend on it become inevitably vulnerable. Conservation and Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) for climate change mitigation and adaptation is one of the main responses to this challenge worth examining. Cameroon has taken some conservation and SFM initiatives that could potentially contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation. Based primarily on thorough review and analysis of policy and law documents as well as relevant literature, this chapter presents Cameroon’s forest sector conservation and management initiatives, especially efforts to practice SFM and the potentials of these initiatives to contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation. It identifies the problems often encountered in practicing SFM beneficial for climate change mitigation and adaptation, and proffers recommendations for improvement.
An ethnobotanical survey was conducted from 1st April to 30th September 2005 among populations living inside and around the National Park of Kalamaloué in the far north of Cameroon. The survey aimed at identifying the plants used in the general pharmacopoeia among local ethnic groups using interviews with households who have a rich knowledge on the plants. A total of 36 medicinal plants were recorded from 37 informants comprising 30 genera and 23 families. Diarrhoea, malaria/fever, rheumatism, wound and cough were the major ailments treated in these households. Piliostigma reticulatum, Tamarindus indica, Balanites aegyptiaca, Azadirachta indica, and Mitragyna inermis were the most cited plants. These plants are also known for similar usages in other African countries and some of them are confirmed in literature to possess biological activity related to ailments indicated.
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