Forest Management Governance: Community leaders share experiences

Forest Management Governance :Community leaders share experiences

Forty-eight community representatives from fourteen community organisations, including eighteen women, drawn from various parts of Cameroon and six others from Nepal, Guatemala, Kenya, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic and Tanzania, met from 5-7 March 2009 in Yaounde to share experiences. In total, more than sixty participants from seven countries and three continents participated in this forum.

The two-day International workshop organised by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI), represented in Cameroon by ICRAF, CIFOR, IUCN, CED, Cam-Eco and CAFT, was an opportunity for participants to share experiences and lessons on approaches and mechanisms on how communities and networks can be effective partners in rural development and policy development.

"If there is no synergy between communities and research, there will be no impact...it is time for researchers and communities to work together for the development of the communities...local knowledge is very import in modern research", the Regional Coordinator of ICRAF-WCA, Dr Zac Tchoundjeu who chaired the event, told participants during the opening. "We are lucky to be custodians of the Congo basin, the world's second largest block of continuous tropical forest after the Amazon. If we do not use it in a sustainable manner, we are all likely to suffer immensely in the future".

The workshop enabled the community organisations to interact with each other in different forums, such as through question and answer sessions, evaluating their own diverse lessons, and comparing these with those of communities from other parts of the developing world. Participants were able to do self analyses, carry-out in-depth discussions and consider their own next steps as communities seeking political voice and relationships with markets. A keynote paper on Forest Community Networks: Rights and Resources Initiative's Engagement and Global Trends was presented by Dr. Augusta Molnar and Dr. Solange Bandiaky.

One of the key issues raised by participants was valuing non-timber forest products (NTFPs). A participant from Burkina Faso amazed her Cameroonian counterparts when she explained how a women's group- the Songtaaba Yarglé are empowering themselves financially and socially by securing control of their shea nut value chain. She explained that they are now at a level certification of their products selling to International markets in Europe and North America. From this example, community leaders from high tree diversity areas realised that they need to make the most of their endowments.

Participants also shared the empowerment exploits of FECOFUN, Nepal; the transnational synergies of ACICAFOC, Guatemala; community organization in Kenya and Tanzania, and women's solidarity from the Central African Republic.

A field trip to Ngali II, a village on the outskirts of Yaounde enabled participants from other communities to see how a group of twenty rural women with the assistance of ICRAF, have been able to integrate high value fruit trees in their farming system.

At the end of workshop, some participants expressed the need for a global coalition through which they could share ideas better and assist one another.

For more details, email: Julius Atia, J.Iseli@cgiar.org