Still off of the Conservation Map in Central Africa:
Bureaucratic Neglect of Forest Communities in Cameroon

By John Nelson, Forest Peoples Programme

Conservation Bureaucrats are Isolated from Communities
In Central Africa there are strong moves by conservation agencies towards the establishment of new, huge conservation zones supported through the Congo Basin Forest Partnership (CBFP) that are leading to a rapid expansion of protected areas. In Cameroon new World Bank funding is now supporting one of the landscapes proposed under the CBFP framework, through an initiative known as TRIDOM. Numerous international donors and conservation agencies are implicated in the funding of this project.

The corporate approach Conservation is using shows that agencies are serious about working together to help overcome the difficulties posed by falling funding for conservation from donors, who are now demanding to see how their investments in conservation also contribute to poverty alleviation. The corporate approach of Conservation contrasts sharply with the strategies of many indigenous Baka hunter-gatherers unable to protect themselves from outside incursion, due to their cultural and socio-economic isolation.

The project area for TRIDOM overlaps the traditional farming, hunting and gathering lands upon which thousands of poor local and indigenous Baka communities have relied for aeons. This project will lead to the imposition of new rules governing the use of forests that will affect communities’ access to and use of forests upon which their livelihoods are based, yet so far communities have not been informed of or involved in the planning for this project. Hence this conservation project represents a direct threat to forest communities’ interests, concordant with a systematic pattern of community neglect and marginalisation observed in the management of other parks in Cameroon that are cornerstones of the TRIDOM initiative.

Many of the donors contributing to the funding and implementation of the TRIDOM project are supposed to be bound by clear operational procedures to protect local and indigenous peoples’ rights and to ensure their participation in the planning of projects affecting their lands such as these. However the isolated communities from this particular “planning region”(1) have been totally neglected during the planning discussions over the past few years carried out in the splendid isolation of capitol cities. This is in direct contravention of international standards protecting these peoples’ rights to participate in these decision-making processes.

Cameroon’s Indigenous Communities: Isolation can protect
Indigenous Baka number 30-40,000 and live in the southern and southeastern areas of Cameroon. They are associated with among others the Bagando Bakwele, Knonbemebe, Vonvo, Zime and Dabjui farmers. Most Baka still rely on hunting and gathering to secure their livelihoods, and even though some Baka also cultivate annual crops, often on the lands of these Bantu patrons, the majority still rely on the forests. Baka in general retain many aspects of their forest-based culture, including short planning horizons, non-hierarchical social structures coupled with community recognition for individuals’ special skills, relatively small communities and an aversion to social conflict (2) and, to those from “outside”, an opportunistic circumspection. For almost all Baka, their forest is their ancestral home, their reliable grocery, the root of their existence, and their customary right, and forests throughout the region are dotted with their favoured hunting and gathering grounds, and their hidden sacred places. Their hunting and gathering lifestyle is associated with high mobility, which means that they can be difficult to locate at certain times of year, so their places of work and home are rarely accurately recorded – they are literally off the map.

This isolative approach has enabled Baka to retain their forest-based culture since pre-colonial times, while the world outside the forest has undergone radical changes. This is also true for Baka who have established permanent villages for cultivation, and who are also generally marginalised from civic and government structures. It has also meant that most Baka have almost no access to modern health care, or formal western education, and most are unable to speak and read French, the official language that dominates the forest zone. Until recent moves by the Cameroon government and NGOs to enable their formal registration few Baka had their own identity cards, and almost all were absent from official census data and electoral lists. Therefore forests retain a huge importance to Baka sustainable livelihoods and their culture.

Despite a long history of persecution of Baka by those entering the forests, usually wanting to extract resources such as rubber, wildlife, timber, minerals, and data on the flora and fauna (3), Baka in general are very open to outsiders. However, given their daily subsistence imperatives and the absence of overarching leaders which characterize their Bantu neighbours, and without established and proven relationships of trust, it is often difficult to secure commitment from their community as a whole for long-term initiatives proposed by government or NGOs. This is now a problem for Baka as permanent changes to the forests around them continue to be imposed from outside.

Corporate Conservation is Taking Over Peoples’ Forests
Across Central Africa(4) over 450,000 square kilometres now fall into protected areas(5), comprising almost 11% of its land, an area the size of Cameroon. The total area to be zoned for conservation in Central Africa is set to grow steeply as ongoing processes to designate new areas are finalised(6), and other ecosystems are put under protection. These area advances are due to the efforts of governmental and non-governmental conservation agencies working in Central Africa working through long-term conservation efforts to establish transboundary protected areas(7), and other new “landscapes” covering Central Africa eco-regions that should double the amount of lands zoned for protection in the Congo Basin.(8) (9)’

In Cameroon this new approach is best exemplified by the TRIDOM(10) project, a new transboundary conservation initiative between Cameroon, the Republic of Congo and Gabon that will join together a tri-national “interzone” bordered by Minkébé , Boumba-Bek, Nki and Odzala National Parks and the Dja Wildlife Reserve. This project will ultimately lead to a regional land use and management plan that will govern access to and use of forests, including those upon which communities now rely.

In May 2004 the World Bank Global Environment Facility (GEF) approved a US$10.5 million Full Project Grant towards this project that, it is claimed, will protect 7.5% of the Congo Basin from exploitation. The project is being implemented by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) will play a key role in implementation on the ground. The GEF is providing approximately ¼ of the total funds for this project, with the remainder coming from a combination of national and international funding sources(11). This project is thus a corporate venture of huge magnitude that implicates donors and international conservation agencies in a top-down project that will fundamentally impact upon local communities and the way they use their forests.

Conservation Agencies are Ruining Their Own Reputations
One can gain a sense of how this project is likely to be implemented by examining the way other conservation projects that are fundamental cornerstones of the TRIDOM initiative are managed. This includes in particular the Dja Wildlife Reserve and Boumba-Bek National Park that, with Minkébé National Park in Gabon and Odzala in the Republic of Congo, roughly demarcate the new CBFP landscape that TRIDOM will help to establish.

The Dja Wildlife Reserve is a World Heritage site that overlaps the traditional lands of indigenous Baka who are mostly now moved out of the park. Their expulsion from the forest and continuing marginalisation in the management of the forests around them is well documented(12), and the persecution of indigenous and local communities by government ecoguards, contrasted against the unmolested traffic of bushmeat out of their areas by commercial operators is at the root of a profound resentment of conservation authorities.(13)

“They (the park managers) have the right to arrest people. But when they confiscate our only antelope, them, those bosses (those high up), what are they thinking? Do they think that they ought to take the antelope that I killed? The antelope that I must use to feed my family? They did not forbid us to eat meat!” (14)

Around the new Boumba-Bek National Park to the east, park boundaries were pre-determined by outsiders, without the knowledge or consent of locals, and hunter-gatherer Baka Pygmy communities are now threatened with exclusions from hunting and gathering areas that they have used since before colonial times, even though they are still almost entirely reliant on hunting and gathering to survive. Remarkably, and unlike elsewhere in Cameroon, Baka in this region represent one of the majority populations for the area.(15)

Campo Ma’an National Park, which is not part of the TRIDOM project, is managed by WWF, lead implementers of the Minkébé-Dja-Odzala project. There Bagyeli Pygmy hunter-gatherers face persistent persecution at the hands of eco-guards, including the burning of a village, illegal arrest, and the confiscation of subsistence products, whose collection is protected by Cameroon law(16). The Campo park was previously established by the Government of Cameroon through another GEF initiative(17). It is now supported by WWF(18), using funds established for this purpose by an oil company(19), as Campo Ma’an now represents one of the environmental offset projects for the Chad-Cameroon Pipeline Project. In Campo Ma’an there is now no doubt that indigenous Bagyeli were marginalised from discussions over the management plan for the park(20), even though it is now categorically proven that their subsistence livelihoods are inextricably linked to hunting and gathering activities within it. (21)

These examples of communities’ negative experiences of conservation projects in Cameroon has led many forest dependent communities to associate plans to protect biodiversity with forced expulsion from their lands without compensation, the elimination of their rights over their traditional lands, the progressive destruction of their livelihoods, the loss of their identities and increasing socio-economic marginalisation(22). This is a serious problem that is now well-documented all over Africa(23). TRIDOM risks repeating this error of community alienation, to the detriment of conservation agendas and reputations, as well as the rights and livelihoods of local communities.

Donors and Conservation Are Not Adhering To Their Own Standards
GEF funds are to be used for activities aiming to protect the global environment in six focal areas(24), including biodiversity, the key focus of the TRIDOM initiative. The GEF’s Public Involvement policy and other Operational Policies require that these activities ensure local participation and address the needs and interests of affected communities, with their prior and informed consent(25). The twin themes of participation and consultation run through the ethos of GEF Operational Strategies, and GEF-funded projects must also comply with the World Bank’s mandatory policy on Indigenous Peoples(26), in addition to UNDP’s good practice Indigenous Peoples Policy, and guidance related to implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity for which the GEF is the financing mechanism.

Given the GEF’s key role in funding 25% of the cost of the TRIDOM initiative, there is no doubt that these policies should have been applied during the preparation of the various project elements to which it is contributing. However, as explained above, adequate consultation with affected communities was not undertaken during TRIDOM project planning, something which FPP highlighted to the UNDP/GEF in 2002(27), when the project was already receiving preparatory support from the GEF(28), and to WWF in 2003, when project preparation was nearly completed(29). The project is not conforming to GEF and World Bank operational policies. In their failure to conform to their own rules, donors are not alone; conservation organisations are also failing to live up to their own standards.

FPP recently examined the degree to which conservation agencies were applying key principles protecting communities’ rights in African protected areas(30), which were agreed at the 1992 World Conservation Congress, and put into implementation over the last 10 years by guidelines drawn up with the support of the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA), the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and World Wildlife Fund International(31). These guidelines recognise the rights of indigenous peoples to use, own and control their traditional territories, and protect their traditional knowledge and skills. They also espouse the development of working partnerships with indigenous peoples based upon the principle of full and informed consent and that they gain equitable shares of conservation benefits. Many of these widely-agreed principles are also embedded in the internationally binding Convention on Biodiversity (CBD), now ratified by over 170 countries, including all those in Central Africa.

Conservation guidelines were further strengthened at the Durban World Parks Congress in September 2003. The theme of the 2003 Congress was “Benefits Beyond Boundaries”, and the Accord and Recommendations which were agreed set important new standards for the rights of indigenous peoples living in and around protected areas, recommending specific targets and actions for governments and protected areas(32). The Durban Recommendations and Action Plan call on countries to undertake reviews of existing conservation laws and policies that impact on indigenous peoples, and to adopt laws and policies giving indigenous peoples and local communities control over their sacred places.

In Central Africa, conservation policy reviews set out in the WPC Action Plan should lead to revision of old legislation that now limits indigenous communities’ access to and use of their forests, especially in and around parks. Legal harmonisation and coherence are also a key components of the COMIFAC Convergence Plan(33), as is the establishment of several transboundary conservaton zones such as the TRIDOM landscape, and support for necessary legal reforms is also included in the TRIDOM project plan. There is therefore a key opportunity to revise national laws affecting forests which are incompatible with international norms of indigenous peoples’ rights.(34)

Conservation Practices Must Change For “Landscapes” To Become Sustainable
The horrendous gap between the rhetoric of “feel good” conservation and the realities faced by Central African indigenous communities struggling to maintain their livelihoods must be closed. Projects such as TRIDOM that fail to adequately consider the rights and welfare of communities who happen to live in biodiverse areas being targeted are doomed to failure, mainly because protected areas will become too expensive to police, and increases in human rights violations that are likely to occur with increased militarization of the forest will prevent many donors from continuing to fund projects of this nature.

Experience in Cameroon and elsewhere shows that local communities whose rights to forests are confiscated by conservation projects will not become an ally of conservation organisations, even where communities share the desire to protect the same forests from other forms of outside exploitation. Most will not be swayed by promises to deliver “new income sources” to their communities in order to compensate them for their loss of forest access and use if these projects do not deliver. Recent experience in Cameroon suggests that communities are right to be sceptical.

Indigenous communities, especially hunting and gathering peoples such as Baka who live throughout the TRIDOM project area, possess rights that are protected by national law, international treaty and international agency guidelines. Increasingly they are gaining the opportunities, skills and confidence to address violations of their rights with their governments, and with the international agencies responsible for funding projects that hurt them. Over time this is leading towards greater respect for their potential role in civil society process by which their sustained participation in conservation will be assured. Conservation projects such as these should take heed: neglect community rights and needs at your peril.

John Nelson
Forest Peoples Programme
johnnelson@blueyonder.co.uk

1.- Redford, K, P Coppolillo, E Sanderson, G Da Fonseca, E, Dinerstien, C. Groves, G. Mace, S. Maginnis, R. Mittermieier, R. Noss, D. Olson, J. Robinson, A. Veddeer, and M. Wright (2003) Mapping the Conservation Landscape. Conservation Biology 17(1):116-131.
2.- Conflict aversion is one source of Baka mobility.
3.- Baka are the source of much of the information on these subjects gathered by academic researchers.
4.- Cameroon, Gabon, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi only included in this analysis.
5.- According to IUCN classification categories I to VI.
6.- For example, in Gabon, where almost a million hectares have yet to be categorised under the IUCN system, even though strict protection measures prohibiting use by communities are already in place over many of them.
7.- Including, for example Sangha Reserve in CAR adjoining Lobéké in Cameroon, the Dja-Boumba Bek-Nki-Odzala-Minkébé transfrontier reserve between Gabon, Congo Republic and Cameroon (TRIDOM), and the Peace Parks along the Albertine Rift area between Uganda and DRC, as well as numerous other proposals currently under discussion, and involving virtually every country in the region.
8.- More precisely named in project documents as the Western Congo Basin Most Forest Ecoregion (WCBMFE).
9.- As favoured by many of those promoting the Congo Basin Forest Partnership, yet in most cases to be funded largely by other sources, such as the World Bank and GEF through grants and loans, and through direct bi-lateral and multilateral (eg, EU) assistance to countries meeting eligibility criteria, including agreement to key conventions such as the CBD. See, for example, GEF (April 5, 2004) GEF Council Work Program Submission for Cameroon 2004-2009: Forestry and Environmental Sector Adjustment Credit (FESAC).
10.- Otherwise known as the Tri-national Dja-Odzala-Minkébé.
11.- International funders include the US/CBFP fund, UNF, EU, WWF, ITTO, WCS, CI, and WWF-US.
12.- Nguiffo, S (2003) One forest and two dreams: the constraints imposed on the Baka in Miatta by the Dja Wildlife Reserve. IN: Nelson, J and L Hossack (eds)(2003) Indigenous Peoples and Protected Areas in Africa: from principles to practice. Forest Peoples Programme: Moreton-in-Marsh. Available in English and French with accompanying video.
13.- Nelson and Morgan, op.cit.
14.- Emmanuel Minsolo, Adjap community, IN: Nelson, J and S Morgan (eds) (2003) Community Testimony from Cameroon. Video to accompany Nelson et.al. (op. cit.).
15.- Nelson, Field Notes 2004.
16.- Owono, J (2003) The extent of Bagyeli Pygmy involvement in the development and Management Plan of the Campo Ma’an UTO. IN: Nelson et. all, op cit. And Nelson and Morgan (2003) op. cit.
17.- GEF. (1995) Republic of Cameroon: Biodiversity Conservation and Management. Project Document, The World Bank, Washington DC.
18.- Through the Foundation for Environment and Development in Cameroon (FEDEC).
19.- Cameroon Oil Transportation Company.
20.- Owono, op. cit.
21.- Tchoumba, Belmond and Handja Georges Thierry (2004) RAPPORT DE LA RENCONTRE DE PRESENTATION DES CARTES DE GESTION DES RESSOURCES FORESTIERES PAR LES BAGYELI AU NORD DU PARC NATIONAL DE CAMPO-MA’AN. CED: Yaounde.
22.- Nelson et al, op. cit.
23.- For further information, see www.forestpeoples.org.
24.- Griffiths, T (2004) Help or Hindrance? The Global Environment Facility, Biodiversity Conservation and Indigenous Peoples. FPP briefing.
25.- Ibid.
26.- World Bank OD 4.20.
27.- Dr. Trinto Mugangu, Regional Technical Advisor to UNDP-GEF Biodiversity Projects in West and Central Africa, FPP Letter of July 2002.
28.- The project was a GEF-funded PDF-B project in 2002.
29.- Letter to Claude Martin, Director General of WWF International, May 27, 2003.
30.- Nelson et al, op cit. Also see Barume, Albert Kwokwo (2000) Heading Towards Extinction? Indigenous Rights in Africa: The Case of the Twa of the Kahuzi-Biega National Park, Democratic Republic of Congo. IWGIA Document No. 101. Copenhagen: IWGIA, and Moreton-in March: Forest Peoples Programme
31.- IUCN- World Conservation Union/WCPA – World Commission on Protected Areas/ WWF – Worldwide Fund for Nature (2000) Principles and guideline on protected areas and indigenous/traditional peoples.
32.- For the full texts see: www.iucn.org/themes/wcpa/wpc2003.
33.- COMIFAC (2002) Plan de Convergence, Action Prioritaires 2003-2005. Declaration des Chef d’Etat de L’Afrique Central sur La Conservation et la Gestion Durable des Forets. COMIFAC : Yaoundé
34.- MacKay, F (2002) Addressing Past Wrongs. Indigenous Peoples and Protected Areas: the right to restitution of lands and resources. Occasional Paper, Forest Peoples Programme, Moreton-in-Marsh.