The Bane of Sustainable Forest Management in Africa: The Case of Ghana
by Lambert Okrah
March 1999

INTRODUCTION
Forests in Africa have suffered wanton distruction due to the unsustainable manner in which forest resources have been exploited and managed. Numerous factors account for this state of affairs, usually classified into direct and indirect/underlying causes.

The thrust of this paper is to provide an overview of the causes of forest destruction, main actors, policy development stages in Ghana as an example and the way forward in sustainable management of African forests with the focus on Ghana.

GENERAL OVERVIEW
In Africa, the primary sector represents the direct causes of forest destruction exemplified by the following: natural forest conservation into agricultural land, establishment of tree plantations, logging and timber extraction, fuelwood consumption, forest fires, human settlement and mining. It is worth noting that some of the causes result from exploitation to earn a living by people whose only means of livelihoods are forests and forest lands. They usually live in the vicinity of forests and their activities are subsistence in nature. Hence, impacts are comparatively minimal and in some cases traditional methods of sustainability are applied. The other form of destruction often the most severe are those who exploit for profits but who do not live in the vicinity of forests. They acquire the forest resource cheaply and thus to make quick profits and depart, apply none sustainable measures.

On the other hand, the underlying causes responsible for the phenomenon are: lack of participation of stake holders in the formulation and implementation of forest policy, the nature of the policy itself,fiscal policies of government; international trade; and the general poverty situation in the continent.

CROP PLANTATION AND AGRICULTURE
It is an incontrovertible fact that large chunks of forests of Africa have been converted into agricultural concerns under food crop and crop plantations with the major offenders being those crops cultivated to meet external needs. They are often under plantations and extensive. It is worth noting that so far as African economies continue to be primary and African countries continue to be the suppliers of primary products to support unsustainable livelihoods elsewhere, this source of destruction is going to persist for a very long long time.

TREE PLANTATIONS
In recent times, to increase the value of the wood resource of African forests, many natural forests are being turned into tree plantations.In fact they are becoming a central focus for many African governments. A workshop was even organised a couple of yaers ago in Ghana under the Theme: Tree Plantations An Answer To Sustainable Forest Management. This comes as a result of the Timber focus of the policy and programmes in Africa. After all these plantations qualify as forests in some circles. The plantation syndrome is epitomised by perverse incentives being provided by governments. Ghana for example is advocating the setting up of a fund to support the promotion of plantation establishment by individuals and companies with appeals being made to poor community land owners to release land for the purpose. An initiative announced by the president last year. I wish to make it clear that this item is being seen as an aspect of deforestation because I do not consider tree plantations as forests and secondly many of the tree plantations in africa are as a result of direct conversion of natural forests.

TIMBER EXTRANTION
As regards timber production and logging, records indicate that it accounts for 70% of the damage and are mostly exported to Europe and USA. Loggers have concessions over long periods some more than 50 years. And with little or no monitoring of the operations of the concessionneers you can imagin the fate of such forests.

FUELWOOD
Fuelwood continues to be a major source of energy for many African homes even in the urban centres where other alternatives exist. It accounts for 95% of rural energy consumption in Ghana.According to the Forestry Department of Ghana, 1.55million cubic metres of firewood and charcoal were produced in Ghana in 1992 alone. It must be noted that not all locally. Some are exported to other parts of the world including countries of West Africa. It is worth noting that though much of the fuelwood is extracted after destruction through other primary activities, fuelwood extraction results in direct forest destruction particularly for charcoal production.

FOREST FIRES
It is also observed that forest fires are responsible for between 10 to 15% of the damage cause dcaused to forests.

OTHERS
Besides the above, human settlements and mining activities constitute some of the direct causes contributing enormously to forest destruction.

UNDERLYING CAUSES

GOVERNMENT FISCAL POLICIES
With regards to underlying causes, fiscal policies of government constitute a very strong bait for forest destruction in Africa. In Ghana for example, the Economic Recovery Programme(ERP) enhanced the exploitation of timber resources. A situation an aid worker described as an opportunity to earn quick money. The timber export earnings increased from $44.1 million in 1986 to $118.0million in 1990; accounting for an increase of 5.9% in1986 to13.2% in 1990 of export earnings. As a result, an estimated environmental degradation cost of $33.4million was imposed on the economy.

DEBT BURDEN
Directly related to the fiscal policy is the accompaniment of debt burden for African countries. Many African Countries with the greatest biodiversity and pressing needs for action to conserve it have huge debt burdens owed to the international community. Thus their ability to finance domestic public spending is severely constrained. An analysis of Ghana's debt shows that debt owed by Ghana on long term basis grew by 9.3% from 1991 to an estimated level of $1,623.5million at the end of 1992. In a desparate bid to service debt, many countries in Africa including Ghana not only plunder forest resources but also neglect budgeting for sustainable forest management practices.

INTERNATIONAL TRADE
International trade with unfair terms also contribute enormously to forest destruction in Africa. Many African countries including Ghana experience huge budget deficits. For example in 1992, the overall balance of trade of Ghana was a deficit of $124.3million. In addition most of the exports of African countries suffer decline in prices leading to overall poor returns in revenue .To remedy the siuation, forest resources often are subjected to overburdening pressures and exploitation rather than conserving them.

POVERTY
The general poverty level in Africa is still among the chain of underlying causes of deforestation and forest degradation. In Sub-Saharan Africa, Gross National Product (GNP) per capita in 1996 was $480 with nearly 70% of the population living in the rural areas. It is common knowledge that for the majority to eke a living, made more difficult by fiscal policies, the onslaught is on the natural environment.

FOREST POLICY
Many studies in the forestry sector single out the lack of a forestry policy as the main cause of the crises, giving the impression that such a policy is the remedy to all ills afflicting the sector. Indeed, this fact encourages some countries to define policy without sufficient attention being given to the establishment and pursuit of procedures and mechanisms that could ensure proper sectoral definition and without even having a clear concept of what is involved in forest resources and their relationships with other resources and sectors of national development.

LACK OF PARTICIPATION IN FOREST POLICY
There is also the daunting problem of lack of participation of stake holders in the formulation of forest policy. For example, in the consultative process in Ghana that led to the development of 1994 Forest and Wildlife Policy, (Kotey: 1998: 56) there was under-representation of traditional rulers, farmers or members of the communities living near, using or dependent on forests.

MAIN ACTORS
The following actors have been identified as being responsible for the destruction of forests of Africa. Farmers, forest-edge dwellers concession holders ie loggers, traditional authorities, government agencies and the international community that derive benefits from the forestry sector. It can be seen clearly from the list of actors that we are all in one way or the other responsible for the current state of affairs of the African forests.

FOREST POLICY DEVELOPMENT IN GHANA
As a group of forest policy makers permit me to give you an insight into forest policy development in Ghana. In Ghana there have been three formal government forest policy statements in Ghana. The first formulated in 1946 and approved by the Gorvernor-in -Council in 1948. For those of you convesant with Ghana's history will notice that that was during the colonial era. The second was announced in 1994 as the Forest and Wildlife Policy with the third in 1998 as the Forestry Act.

The 1948 policy which remained in force for nearly half a century has had a pronounced impact on forest and people. Emphasis was on protection and management of the reserves with the implicit expectation that all forests outside the permanent forest reserves will ultimately be converted to agricultural land. In this way there was a systematic removal of all known timber species then before the farmers arrived who did not arrived though at the anticipated time. The forest policy adopted in 1948 can in retrospect be said to be a generalised statement of intent; bones without meat. This is perhaps due to the fact that the measures required to implement the policy were not explicitly made a part of the policy, neither was there any firm commitment from the state to provide the resources required for such implementation.

The 1980s witnessed a failing in the policy and legislationand general public outcry and discontent about the 1948 forestry policy. These frustrations led to some in-house Forestry Department review exercises beginning around 1984.

THE 1994 FOREST AND WILDLIFE POLICY
The process of formal policy revision that culminated in the 1994 Forest and Wildlife Policy was accelerated in the 1980s. The 1994 policy presents an attempt to project the general concerns of the Ghanaian populace. It specified principles on rights of local access to basic natural resources, local democracy, participatory management and protection of forest and wildlife resources.

In 1994, Forest and Wildlife policy seems to have provided a good strategic framework for actions within the forestry sector. The new policy established the governments' aim as being the conservation and sustainable development of forest resources. As intimated the major flaw of this policy was that it alienated most stakeholders particularly forest owners and the traditional authority in the consultative process. Considering the key thrust of the policy- enabling wider participation, the process remains notable for its lack articulation with any man on the farm or woman gatherer near the forest. It thus however creates an encouraging opportunity for people like you and me to force the hand of government to do what he has expressed the intention to do and uphold in the policy.

THE 1998 FORESTRY ACT
This act aims at consolidation and replacement of all existing forestry legislations. It proposes clear identification of land and forest-holding communities as the primary clients of a proposed Forest Service, which will pursue sustainable forest management. We are however not optimistic that this new policy will be exonerated from the flaws that were associated with its predecessors. Particularly in the area of paticipation and above all setting the tone for the development of institutions that will focus on wholistic suastainable forest management approaches rather then being timber biase.

OBSERVATION
By far, the evolution of policy reveals some recurring hazards which those in policy processes need to guard against in the future. Poorly communicated policies can do more harm than good, particularly when it is misunderstood. The process through which stakeholder participation is fostered needs more policy attention than the substance of the negotiation. Policy development in the forestry sector needs to be broad based applying bottom-up processes.

CONCLUSION
Forests in Africa offer exciting challenges that need concerted effort and action to address them. Collaborative approach involving all stakeholders in forestry issues, combining economic potential with human well-being and rooting decision-making in places where people are really motivated to take action constitute the linch pin upon which sustainable forest in Africa hinges.