For 20 years, the Congo Basin countries have been implementing policies aimed at the sustainable management of their forest resources and at poverty reduction. These policies target the major timber concessions, whose production is exported, but overlook the informal small-scale chainsaw milling sector, which supplies domestic and regional markets. Yet this sector has taken the lead in terms of the volume of timber produced and provides jobs and income. At a time when States are increasingly urged to guarantee the legality – or even sustainability – of their production, it is urgent that they implement policies to ensure their small-scale chainsaw milling operations are more sustainable and to formalise the sector.
Depuis deux décennies, les pays forestiers du bassin du Congo mettent en oeuvre des politiques pour gérer durablement leurs ressources forestières et réduire la pauvreté. Ces politiques visent les grandes concessions forestières, dont la production est exportée, mais ignorent le secteur informel du sciage artisanal, qui approvisionne les marchés domestiques et régionaux. Pourtant ce secteur est devenu majoritaire en termes de volume de bois produit et fournit emplois et revenus. Alors que les États sont de plus en plus incités à garantir la légalité, voire la durabilité, de leur production, il est urgent qu'ils mettent en oeuvre des politiques pour rendre plus durables les pratiques de sciage artisanal et formaliser le secteur.
La République du Congo a adopté une loi forestière en 2000 qui met l'accent sur le secteur forestier industriel à grande échelle orienté vers l'exportation. Le bois d'oeuvre tiré d'une exploitation à plus petite échelle et tourné vers le marché intérieur a été négligé. Ce bois n'est pas enregistré dans les statistiques officielles et il est essentiellement produit sans titre valide. Or le Congo a paraphé en 2009 puis signé en 2010 l'Accord de partenariat volontaire (APV) avec la Commission européenne qui l'engage à assurer la légalité de toute la production nationale de bois d'ici à 2013. Si la préparation de la mise en oeuvre de l'APV est avancée pour les concessions forestières notamment dans la région septentrionale du pays, le secteur domestique du bois est encore largement ignoré dans ce processus. Ce rapport présente une évaluation quantitative et qualitative de ce marché intérieur du bois scié afin de dégager des options permettant sa légalisation et sa pérennité. Les estimations reposent sur un suivi permanent des entrées de sciages à Brazzaville entre août 2008 et novembre 2009, sur un suivi des flux de vente des sciages sur les marchés de Pointe Noire entre février et novembre 2009, et sur 62 entretiens réalisés avec des scieurs artisanaux dans quatre zones d'approvisionnement. Les estimations globales sur les ventes et la consommation de sciage pour une année sont récapitulées dans le tableau suivant. Si on exclut les sciages industriels vendus sur le marché domestique, la production de sciages informels dépasse le volume des exportations congolaises de sciages en 2009, année toutefois marquée par une crise de l'industrie forestière durant laquelle les exportations ont été deux fois inférieures au niveau moyen des cinq années précédentes. Ce sous-secteur emploie aujourd'hui un grand nombre de personnes, fournissant au moins 600 emplois directs permanents et 300 emplois occasionnels dans les deux villes. En zone rurale, l'activité de sciage artisanal produit au minimum l'équivalent de 2000 emplois directs. C'est largement inférieur à l'emploi généré aujourd'hui par le secteur industriel, estimé autour de 7500 emplois. Il s'agit d'une activité économique à part entière qui engendre un chiffre d'affaires annuel autour de 15 milliards de F.CFA, dont une partie alimente les économies rurales à hauteur de 3 milliards de F.CFA par an. Ces revenus en milieu rural proviennent de la vente des arbres par les propriétaires coutumiers et par les salaires versés aux manutentionnaires, à hauteur de 33 000 F.CFA par mètre cube de bois scié. Les autorités administratives déconcentrées bénéficient également de cette activité puisque la " parafiscalité " compose environ 18 % du coût de revient de la production de sciage artisanal en zone rurale, c'est-à-dire autour de 12 000 F. CFA/m3. Au total, ce sont environ 1,2 milliard de F.CFA qui sont indûment prélevés tous les ans par les représentants de certains services administratifs déconcentrés. Ce secteur du sciage artisanal fait face toutefois à plusieurs difficultés et menaces. Tout d'abord, l'exploitation actuelle semble mettre en cause la pérennité de la ressource puisque les scieurs parcourent des distances importantes pour accéder aux arbres et que ces derniers sont souvent de faible diamètre. Si les " bois rouges " sont majoritaires sur les marchés de Brazzaville et parviennent principalement par le fleuve Congo, les consommateurs de Pointe Noire privilégient l'okoumé (Aucoumea klaineana), notamment pour les coffrages. Deuxièmement, la réglementation forestière actuelle - principalement le permis spécial - semble peu en mesure d'attirer les scieurs informels vers la légalité. Une adaptation ou une révision des prescriptions légales serait utile pour faciliter l'accession à des pratiques légales. Cet accès facilité aux titres légaux d'exploitation devrait s'accompagner d'une professionnalisation des scieurs artisanaux, en termes techniques, financiers, et institutionnels. Enfin
One of the main objectives of the 1994 Cameroonian forestry law is to improve the management of production forests by including minimum safeguards for sustainability into compulsory forest management plans. As of 2007, about 3.5 million hectares (60%) of the productive forests are harvested following the prescriptions of 49 approved management plans. The development and implementation of these forest management plans has been interpreted by several international organizations as long awaited evidence that sustainable management is applied to production forests in Cameroon. Recent reviews of some plans have concluded, however, that their quality was inadequate. This paper aims at taking these few analyses further by assessing the actual impacts that approved management plans have had on sustainability and harvesting of commercial species. We carry out an assessment of the legal framework, highlighting a fundamental flaw, and a thorough comparison between data from approved management plans and timber production data. Contrary to the principles adhered to by the 1994 law, we find that the government has not yet succeeded in implementing effective minimum sustainability safeguards and that, in 2006, 68% of the timber production was still carried out as though no improved management rules were in place. The existence of a number of approved management plans cannot be used a proxy for proof of improved forest management.
Since the second half of the 2000s, several options on the implementation of community forests in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have been discussed in the country's technical and political circles. Propositions and pilot testing have increased in the last 2-3 years, in parallel with the promise of substantial international funding. As a result, several initiatives have been tested or are under development in the forest area of the DRC. Yet, the regulatory framework remains incomplete and very much debated. In the absence of a clear regulation and indeed political direction, the funding of current initiatives is often proposed with divergent purposes and conducted with different approaches. We reviewed the current experiences and found that none has conducted an estimation of the potential financial return of the business models they elaborated for/with the concerned communities. We thus conducted a socio-economic feasibility study for three case studies in Orientale province, by estimating the costs of developing/implementing activities and the benefits expected for communities on a 5 years horizon. Four main results are drawn from this analysis: (1) all experiences show a negative financial performance, the initial and implementation costs being significantly above the medium-term profits; (2) the main benefit expected by communities is clarifying and securing their customary land tenure; (3) a majority of the activities conducted in the framework of the 'community forest' model deal with rural development and not forestry operations per se, and therefore could be promoted and conducted without having to engage in a process of designing, establishing and maintaining the community forest model; (4) local organizations set up to oversee community forests are complex, expensive and little known by most inhabitants. We conclude by discussing and proposing a few models that could improve the effectiveness of community forestry in the DRC.
With charcoal set to remain an important energy source throughout Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the foreseeable future, this paper focuses on improving the efficiency of carbonisation as one contribution to more sustainable charcoal value chains. While the efficiency of wood-to-charcoal conversion is often considered a technical matter of kiln performance, this study aims to shed light on the role of the enabling institutional context and the capacities of the players involved. We first review initiatives for enhanced charcoal production in different SSA countries. We then compare the data on carbonisation processes in two production areas in the Democratic Republic of Congo: Yangambi and the Bateke Plateau. The main findings are: 1) Large gains in wood-to-charcoal conversion rates are possible by improving carbonisation techniques, but success largely depends on the context-specific appropriateness of kiln solutions, on the capacity and awareness of producers and on the enabling institutional context. 2) Enhancing capacity among operators and other stakeholders requires efficient kiln techniques, but also raising awareness on benefits and sustainable sourcing options, building financial and management skills among producer organisations and improving transportation, handling and marketing. 3) The illegal or informal status of charcoal producers across SSA detracts from the efficiency of charcoal production processes, while an enabling institutional framework facilitates producers' access to permits and funding, provides for simple taxation with incentives for more sustainable practices and links technical requirements for carbonisation to sustainable sourcing and end-uses. The success or failure of improved kiln techniques and related socio-ecological outcomes is co-determined by solutions that include the aspects of capacity enhancement, acceptability and enabling institutions identified in this paper. Further development of these solutions in partnership with producers enhances the potential for more sustainable fuelwood value chains.
Le cadre de réglementation camerounais sur les forêts, la faune et la pêche oblige les exploitants forestiers à payer une redevance forestière (RF), dont la moitié doit être reversée aux communes rurales (40 %) et aux villages riverains (10 %) des concessions forestières. La RF a pour objectifs principaux d'apporter des contributions régulières au budget de l'État et d'améliorer les moyens d'existence en milieu rural, par le biais d'une redistribution équitable et efficace des bénéfices tirés de la forêt. Après une décennie de mise en oeuvre et la redistribution d'environ 85 millions € à une cinquantaine de communes, les avis dont font état les publications sont unanimes pour dire que les impacts sur les moyens d'existence de la distribution de la RF aux communautés sont faibles. Les évaluations exhaustives des impacts de la redistribution de la RF sur les administrations locales sont moins nombreuses. Cet article examine si la RF peut être un outil de développement local par le biais des autorités locales (les communes), en accordant une attention particulière aux aspects économiques, ainsi qu'aux aspects liés à l'équité et à la gouvernance. Une des conclusions les plus importantes est que les maires, bien qu'ils soient élus et unanimement accusés de détournements de fonds et de mauvaise gestion de la RF, ne sont bien souvent que des boucs émissaires dans un système politique complexe qui ne permet pas à la population rurale de sanctionner directement les utilisations abusives de la RF par l'intermédiaire du système électoral actuel.
Since the second half of the 2000s, several options for implementing community-based forest management in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), like the local community forest concession (LCFC), have been discussed in the country's technical and political circles. Proposals and pilot testing have increased in the last five years, but the funding of initiatives is often proposed for divergent purposes and taking different approaches. We reviewed current experiences in the Eastern province of the DRC and found that nobody has carried out an estimation of the financial returns of the business models they drew up for/with the communities involved. We therefore conducted a financial feasibility analysis for two case studies, estimating the costs of developing/implementing activities and the benefits expected for the communities within the next five years. Three main conclusions were drawn from the analysis: (1) most activities conducted under the LCFC model deal with rural development, and not with forestry operations per se; (2) several forestry activities such as biodiversity conservation or carbon sequestration are not detailed in the management documents and appear to have little legitimacy for local populations; (3) the two LCFCs show a negative financial performance because the inception and implementation costs are substantially higher than the medium-term profits. Community forestry is unlikely to develop in the DRC unless local people are guaranteed that it will contribute to improving their livelihoods, notably their financial and physical capital. This requires that LCFC initiatives focus on actual productive uses of forest resources, which financial performance is systematically assessed ex ante. A simplification of the legal constraints is also needed to reduce the cost of creating and managing a LCFC.
After more than 20 years and substantial investments of time and money, Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification of tropical forest management is due for a stringent impact evaluation. For any social, ecological, and economic outcomes to be attributed to FSC certification, rival explanations need to be ruled out. We recognize that different types of knowledge about FSC impacts derived from information gathered through a range of methods can satisfy the evidence-needs of different stakeholders. But this paper describes a roadmap based on rigorous methods to assess whether FSC certification delivers on its expected outcomes and the underlying mechanisms through which changes can be attributable to FSC. To this end, background studies that provide contextual knowledge related to implementation of FSC certification are proposed to account for any positive self-selection biases and to capture the temporal dynamics of certification including changes in the sociopolitical and economic contexts that influence certification decisions.
FSC natural forest management certification has been implemented for >20 years. FSC's goal is to provide a system through which responsible forest management is recognized by consumers and others. Our team works on the design of an empirical theory-based impact evaluation (IE) of the biophysical, social, economic, and policy impacts of this intervention in Brazil, Peru and Indonesia. The range of expected outcomes, and the scales at which impacts ensue, forced us to use inter and trans-disciplinary approaches to define the IE scope and goals. While this research is still ongoing, our goal is to share lessons learned in tackling the complexity of the social-ecological systems where the FSC intervention occurs. We present ideas that see evaluation as a knowledge-generating process as well as a goal in itself. Thus, we introduce the rationale for a multi-stakeholder platform to assure the IE design would be built upon discussions with a range of social actors on the value of this knowledge-generation research to improve their conservation practice. We introduce a conceptual framework that lays out the foundation for the IE work, tightly linked to relevant concepts for conservation biologists such as adaptive management and systems thinking. We discuss results of preparatory studies that provide information used as a backbone for the IE design and that attempts, from the different angles where conservation trade-offs occur, to provide a roadmap for the IE. Studies include a descriptive analysis of auditing and accreditation activities aimed at providing transparency and accountability to the audit component behind certification. We developed country-based studies of political economy factors that underlie historical issues regarding forested lands use and analyze these issues across countries. We ground on these quantitative and qualitative studies hypotheses on how forest management decisions in general and FSC certification in particular, have occurred.
