Cameroon: When women mobilise to protect the moabi
Southern Cameroon is red and green.
Green like the forest of the Congo basin that breathes and has
a heartbeat and that offers its inhabitants the biotic resources
necessary to subsist; and red like the dusty roads where trucks
run, transporting the bodies of forest giants that will be turned
into furniture, flooring, doors, etc. Along Cameroon’s open veins
flows its vital element to the port of Douala, where the vampire
from the North comes to quench its thirst…
Voices of women reach us from the forest.
In Southeast Cameroon women are organizing to improve their living
conditions and to preserve a mythical tree, the moabi (Baillonella
toxisperma). This forest giant from the basin of the Congo River
is being industrially exploited at a pace that is hard to determine
but that is affecting local peoples and in particular, women.
For the peoples of Southern Cameroon,
the moabi is of considerable importance. Traditionally the “Sacred
Tree,” dead ancestors were placed sitting at the foot of the tree
or in a hole in its trunk; thus the moabi incarnated the power
of the dead person. As the “Pharmaceutical Tree” its bark, its
leaves and roots served to make over fifty traditional drugs used
among other things for menstrual pains, vaginal infections and
after childbirth. As the “Nutritional Tree” its edible fruits
reduce women’s work when it bears fruit, the seeds produce a good
quality oil that is under the control of women from the time of
gathering to the time to take it to market, representing one of
the main sources of income in the areas where it grows.
Industrial exploitation of the forest
started in Cameroon at the beginning of the twentieth century,
during German colonization in the coastal region, to spread later
to the whole country at the pace the railway was built. And, although
some industrialists cannot find an explanation to the dwindling
of maobis, it may be seen that the distribution
of these species is inversely proportional
to the historic presence of forest exploitation. In fact, maobi
trading is lucrative as it is a very good quality timber for carpentry
and fetches a high price on the international market. It is really
a luxury product that finds its place in yachts or estates, as
decks, windows, panelling, etc. Maobi parquet was used to cover
the floors of the Paris Champs Elysées Theatre.
In Cameroon, the international timber
trade is exclusively in the hands of foreign companies, mainly
French, Italian, Lebanese and more recently, Chinese. However,
the moabi market continues to be very “Franco-French”: according
to official statistics, between 2000 and 2005, 45 percent of the
volume of moabi was produced by French companies and 71 % of the
production was sold in France (24% in Belgium). It is thus
obvious that the moabi trade is in perfect coincidence with the
trade ties with the old metropolis.
Since the eighties, many villages are
in dispute with the forest exploitation companies surrounding
the Dja reserve, a region that is rich in moabis. The villagers
have sent numerous letters to the relevant authorities, claiming
their right to use the forest and asking for moabis to be protected.
They have taken various measures, such as organizing meetings
with the industrialist, marking the moabis to point out their
right to use them and blocking the entry of heavy machinery until
the army intervened… but none of these measures really achieved
its objective. At Bedoumo, the army violently repressed
a strike aimed at blocking the entry of the logging companies.
The villagers were obliged to pick up the cinders of the fires
they had light along the road to warm them from the cold night
air with their bare hands, they were beaten and tortured and as
a result some pregnant women had miscarriages. Confrontations
of this type mobilize the entire community, although in general
it is the men who appear at the forefront, as supposedly they
are the ones who have contact, both oral and written, with the
authorities.
However, the two conflicts specifically
related with the moabi tree that made the villagers physically
confront the companies were either promoted by women or led by
women. In Bapilé, the Italian company FIPCAM opened up a
road (during a feast day when the villagers had gone to a neighbouring
village) through the space reserved for the community forest and
destroyed a cemetery. The following day, on hearing the noise
made by the lumberjacks and discovering that various moabis in
flower had been felled, five village women went to the forest
to try to convince the workers to give up their logging, with
no success. The following days, the whole community mobilized
to block the road and the machinery, struggles and strikes went
on for a month, and finally they achieved the protection of some
of the remaining trees and recognition of the damage caused (300
moabis had been felled). Although compensation has not yet been
payed.
In the village of Zieng-Ognoul, Pallisco,
a French industrialist opened up a road in the space reserved
for the community forest. When the villagers heard the noise,
Mrs Koko Sol marched to the forest with various villagers, mainly
women, and threatened to set fire to the machinery if the loggers
did not stop their work. As a result, the loggers were expelled
and a large number of moabis were preserved; unfortunately eleven
had already been felled.
In some cases conflicts arise between
men and women in the villages. In the first place because the
men work in the logging companies and are responsible for making
inventories of timber species. In the second, because some of
them sell moabis from their land to clandestine sawmills. A woman
from Ebimimbang affirmed that “the men are guilty because they
are in contact with the industrialists and are well aware that
the moabi is very important to the women.”
The scarcity of moabis causes particular
prejudice to women who must find other options for food; receive
less income and do without medicinal ingredients or medicines
for the specific treatment of female genital diseases. This situation
is added to the masculine domination that they must endure in
their societies.
Faced with this situation, Mrs Rufine
Adjowa decided to establish an NGO known as CADEFE. Its objective
is to improve the living conditions of women by protecting the
moabi. The idea is to gather village women in small groups or
even cooperatives to develop the sale of moabi oil. The peasant
women can thus obtain substantial income that enables them to
pay their children’s schooling and medical attention or to purchase
the oil and soap they need without having to ask their husbands
for money.
Because of their exclusion, all these
women make up a social group able to promote changes in relations
of power and to propose effective solutions for sustainable and
equitable management of forest ecosystems.
By Sandra Veuthey, based on the author’s
field observations. E-mail: sandra.veuthey@campus.uab.cat
