• Cameroon: Dam on the River Lom will flood the Pangar-Djerem Wildlife Reserve
• Gabon: Can National Parks save the forests?
• Madagascar: Sacrality as a way of conservation
• Nigeria: Either legal or illegal, commercial logging in Cross River State forest must be banned

LOCAL STRUGGLES AND NEWS

- Cameroon: Dam on the River Lom will flood the Pangar-Djerem Wildlife Reserve

A project to build a hydroelectric dam on the River Lom, a few kilometres downstream of its confluence with River Pangar, presented 13 years ago and suspended in 1999, has been resumed in October last year. The Cameroonian government decided to go ahead with the plans of the Lom-Pangar hydroelectric project, which includes a 50 meter high barrage flooding an area of 610 sq.km and a hydroelectric plant of approximately 50 MW. The first step in the process is a new environmental impact study.

A so-called "panel of the independent experts" charged with controlling and evaluating the environmental studies carried out, and to deliver its opinions on the measures, had its first visit to the area to be affected by the dam.

The dam would impact on rivers that are tributaries to Cameroon's River Sanaga, a river basin contributing with over 90 percent of the country's hydroelectric energy, and also would inevitably flood parts of the Pangar-Djerem Wildlife Reserve. The area, which still awaits formal protection by the Cameroonian parliament, would become Cameroon's largest reserve in the bordering area between rainforests in the south and savannah in the north.

The Pangar-Djerem Reserve has already been affected by the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline, which runs for 54 kilometres through the proposed reserve. Parts of the reserve had also been impacted heavily by the opening of a rail line running between Belabo and Ngaoundal in 1970, which allowed for encroachment on the area by intruders.

In addition to the physical damage on the landscape and the plant and animal life (chimpanzees, elephants, gorillas, black rhinos, etc.) of one of the world's most undisturbed areas, the dam will affect the societies living in the area, including indigenous people like the Baka and Bakola (commonly called Pygmies) of Cameroon, who will see their life-styles disrupted.

On March 14, 2004, the 7th annual International Day of Action Against Dams and For Rivers, Water and Life was held all over the world, denouncing that “millions of people worldwide are facing serious threats to their livelihoods and cultures due to the construction of large dams. Intended to boost development, these projects have led instead to further impoverishment, degraded environments and human rights violations. An estimated 40-80 million people have been forcibly evicted from their lands to make way for dams. Evidence shows that these people have often been left economically, culturally and psychologically devastated.”

The Lom-Pangar hydroelectric project would have many of those effects and none of the problems it would create can be solved with environmental impact studies, which usually serve the purpose of providing destructive projects with "scientific" backing. Existing experience on large dams is more than sufficient to show that this dam should simply not be built.

Article based on information from: “Cameroon orders environmental study of dam project”, afrol News, http://www.afrol.com/articles/12138 ; “About Rivers and Dams”, International Rivers Network, http://www.irn.org/basics/ard/

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- Gabon: Can National Parks save the forests?

National Parks are not playing a key role in the economic development of Central African countries. However, they are seen as the cornerstone of the world’s conservation efforts. Thus the president of Gabon, El Hadj Omar Bongo Odimba, announced the creation of thirteen National Parks at the Earth Summit, held in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2002.

Encouraged by notable international NGOs, Bongo Odimba enacted these parks in 2003; some of them have been selected as the key priority landscapes in the framework of the Congo Basin Forest Partnership, an international initiative whose goal is to halt the loss of biodiversity and ecosystems functions in the Congo Basin for the benefit of the people of Central Africa and the global community.

These factors, along with the emphasis on ecotourism and the splendour of Central Africa’s natural and cultural resources, suggest that Central Africa is working to conserve biodiversity and augment the economic benefits from its parks.

But, the reality is showing that this perspective has been too optimistic and that the possibility of changes in political commitments has been underestimated. Nowadays, this reality has caught up on optimistic proponents of speeding the creation of National Parks in Central Africa.

News from Gabon inform that large areas of Ivindo National Park are being logged by SEEF (Société Equatoriale d’Exploitation Forestière), while SOUTHERNERA (South African Company) and one Chinese Company have been authorized to oil exploration respectively in the Loango National Park and the Mount Cristal National Park (Ona, Environnement-Gabon, septembre 2004).

Of course, for NGOs, this called for a campaign warning about the destruction of National parks (Ona, Environnement-Gabon). Although it might be a reasonable short-term NGO reaction, this response is not sufficient, because it undervalues existing incentives in the country to welcome actors (foreign governments, financial institutions, companies or NGOs), which have the potential to mobilise financial resources and to respond to government and private economic interests.

Thus National Parks, which are competing with financial interests, should have stronger arguments than "Parks for people of Central Africa and the global community." Also, in Central Africa (as well as in the entire Africa), park development requires a much wider perspective than that provided by "conservation biology". Otherwise, National Parks will be insidiously but effectively allocated for resource-use.

All the above raise old, but critical issues related to biodiversity conservation in Central Africa, particularly given that Bongo Odimba created National Parks with the assistance of the world's greatest international conservation organizations. The question is: did these organizations carry out an in-depth assessment of the areas and the constraints before encouraging Bongo Odimba to create National Parks?

Because of logging and oil exploration- which can result in oil exploitation-, what exactly should conservation be in the concerned areas? In terms of what societies need (for example, jobs and economic growth), what should the newly created National parks provide to the people of Gabon? Who are these parks to serve?

By: Assitou Ndinga, e-mail: ndinga_assitou@yahoo.fr

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- Madagascar: Sacrality as a way of conservation

The forest of Sakoantovo in southern Madagascar is sacred for the people that inhabit it. In general, a sacred forest is a place that is venerated and reserved for the cultural expression of a community, and its access and management are governed by traditional powers. Sacred forests cover a total area of 60,000 hectares in the Spiny Forest ecoregion of Madagascar, one of the biologically richest drylands on earth.

To the Mahafaly and Tandroy communities of southern Madagascar, the forest has always held a central position within social and cultural life, inspiring respect through a great number of taboos and norms. Sacred forests, where the remains of royal ancestors lie, are also sources of many medicinal plants and have therefore been zealously protected for centuries. However, they are threatened by the dismantling of the old production and consumption systems which have allowed for their conservation. Handing the control and management of these natural resources to their traditional stewards is therefore necessary to warrant more effective, sustainable conservation.

The Sakoantovo forest is extraordinary. Skinny green tubes covered in spines grow alongside tall trees topped with tufts of needle-like leaves. Squat baobabs with swollen trunks stand beside tangled masses of thick, thorny, branches. Above this collection of alien-looking plants is a clear blue sky; below, red sand.

Venture further in, and the dry spiny forest gradually changes to riparian forest growing along a riverbed (they form the transition between the aquatic and the terrestrial environment). Here the forest looks more familiar. Tamarind trees dominate, but there are also figs and other plant species. There is an incredible feeling of serenity, the stillness only broken by occasional birdsong and the gentle grunting of lemurs.

The local Mahafaly people have known for a long time that the forest is special — for them, it is sacred. “This forest is a burial site for our ancestors,” says Evoriraza, who lives in a nearby village with his wife and two children. "There is a sacred tree in the middle of the forest that cannot be touched, and also sacred animals such as tortoises, lemurs, and birds. It is taboo, or fady as we say, to hunt them. Some animals are like spirits or ghosts, and can harm people if they transgress these prohibitions.”

There are very few riparian forests left in Madagascar. The world’s fourth-largest island has already lost at least 80 per cent of its original forest cover — with over half this loss in the last 100 years. Sacred forests are no exception.

Traditional practises — which in the past have helped protect wildlife — are eroding. Madagascar is one of the most economically disadvantaged parts of the world, with a climate not always favourable to farming. When people need to eat, taboos on hunting certain species can break down. The forest is already a hardware store and pharmacy for local people; in times of famine it becomes their food store as well.

"Many people do illegal things, but they do so out of necessity," says Avimary, a Mahafaly prince. "They are forced to cut down trees to make charcoal, so that they can make a living and earn enough money to feed their children. Cutting down trees is not something they do willingly."

The entry of the modern world into Madagascar is also affecting traditional practises. "Some of the younger generations ignore the law and the word of their elders," says Avimary.

But Sakoantovo forest could show how to turn this depressing picture around. In June this year, the management rights over the forest were legally transferred from the Malagasy government to the local Mahafaly community.

The idea is that the people who know best how to look after the land are those who actually live on it. The Mahafaly now have the power to manage the forest — something the government had little success with in the past. Illegal felling and collection of medicinal plants had all been on the increase. But now, through local management committees, the Mahafaly have committed to sustainably manage their sacred forest in cooperation with local authorities.

This represents a significant departure from previous beliefs that the way to protect forests was to set up national parks that excluded local people. Indeed, this conservation approach is not really new to the Malagasy. They have a phrase, 'tontolo iainana', which means ‘the world about us’ — a concept of human being and nature living together in harmony.

Article based on information from: “Sacred forests conserve Madagascar's biodiversity”, afrol News, http://www.afrol.com/articles/11095 ; “Sacred sites and spiny forests”, Richard Hamilton, http://www.panda.org/news_facts/newsroom/features/news.cfm?uNewsID=8503

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- Nigeria: Either legal or illegal, commercial logging in Cross River State forest must be banned

Even though Nigeria’s forests are only some ten percent of the size they were just two decades ago, they still provide an incredibly rich and diverse habitat. From the tropical highlands to the lowland rainforest, from the plateau grasslands to the savanna, from the swamps to the mangrove forests.

The forests of Cross River State in southeastern Nigeria are the last remaining rainforests in Nigeria and are home to 2,400 native forest communities comprising 1.5 million people, the highest primate diversity on the planet --including the world’s most endangered gorillas--, and an estimated 20 percent of the world’s butterfly species.

For global logging companies, Nigerian forests appear to be an easy target. Environmental regulations in the country are rarely enforced, and many officials in the recently ousted Abacha dictatorship were notoriously corrupt --more interested in personal gain than in the protection of Nigeria’s natural resources.

Hong Kong-based Western Metal Products Company (WEMPCO) is one of the most destructive companies operating in the region (see also http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Nigeria/Odey.html ). Although they own the rights to log in some areas of Cross River State, WEMPCO flaunts regulations and logs illegally in the forest buffer zone surrounding the Cross River National Park, not only threatening to decimate the forest’s magnificent hardwoods, but also endangering the livelihoods of Cross River State’s forest communities.

Logging has significantly reduced animal habitat, shrinking the animal populations that serve as a traditional source of protein in Cross River State. The bushmeat that was once plentiful is now scarce. The plundering of trees which provide shelter has left whole areas without windbreakers or sufficient trees to check the devastating rainstorms. Thus, the roofs of houses are often blown off by the slightest rainstorm.

Since 1996, environmental and human rights groups across the world have been campaigning against the destructive logging activities of WEMPCO which has operated in Cross River State since 1992, illegally harvesting and exporting the state’s forest resources, inciting and inflicting violence and threatening those who have spoken out against their activities. Prior to doing business in Cross River State, WEMPCO was kicked out of Nigerian Ogun State, for the same flagrancies of forest management policies and laws.

Indeed, the threats to the rainforest continue. The Nigerian government commissioned in 2003 the operation of WEMPCO's wood processing factory and approved a new 540 square mile logging concession located on the river upstream from many forest communities and the national park. The logging concessions will devastate the remaining forest in the buffer zones surrounding the national park. The mill’s voracious appetite has the capacity to process twice the amount of wood legally designated by the concessions, sending the company looking for more hardwood in nearby Cameroon. By-products of WEMPCO’s hardwood processing mill threaten to pollute the water sources of two million tribal people and threaten the habitat of the endangered gorilla and many other rare primate species.

Now, the NGO Coalition for the Environment and its members, including 2003 Goldman Prize Winner Mr. Odigha Odigha, Mr. Odey Oyama of Rainforest Resource Development Centre and Mr. Oronto Douglas of Environmental Rights Action, which has been actively opposing WEMPCO’s logging activities, has something to celebrate. The Governor of Cross River State, Mr. Donald Duke, has recently approved the closure of the WEMPCO wood-processing factory and the immediate cessation of the company’s forest-related activities due to what it described as unwholesome activities contrary to the earlier agreement reached with the company.

However, the great menace of an unsustainable global log trade pervades the whole logging activity, either legal or illegal. That is why West Africa Rainforest Network continues pushing for a ban on all commercial logging for the next 12 months.

Article based on information from: “West Africa Rainforest Network”, http://www.earthisland.org/warn/ ; “Odigha Odigha”, http://www.goldmanprize.org/recipients/recipientProfile.cfm?recipientID=124