l Accessible technologies and FPIC: independent monitoring with forest communities in Cameroon 153
(EU) initiated the Forest Law Enforcement,
Governance and Trade (FLEGT) process in
2003 to address illegal logging in countries
that export timber to EU territory (Brown et
al., 2009). EU-supplier countries must sign
a voluntary partnership agreement (VPA)
describing how they will improve FLEGT
regulations. Cameroon began negotiating
their VPA with the EU in 2006, signing the
agreement in 2010.1
Although detrimental to the country’s
economy and environment, illegal logging
provides a few men with employment. But
logging undermines forest-dependant
people’s long-term livelihoods, especially
women and the elderly, who lose vital food
and medicinal trees. Weak governance,
poverty and ineffective local-level political
structures allows most illegal loggers to
work with impunity so long as local elites
are assured an income.
Project aims, participants and approach
Participatory mapping is a key way for
communities to assert their rights. Many
projects run by NGOs and communitybased organisations (CBOs) support ILCs
in mapping their territories.2
The overall project objective was to
support and strengthen the capacity of
ILCs to independently monitor resource
use, document their territory and present
their findings to relevant stakeholders.
ILCs welcomed the opportunity to participate. The project aimed to:
• improve forest governance through
resource monitoring;
• effectively engage forest communities in
key processes related to forest management;
• create an advocacy platform for dialogue
between communities, CBOs and government institutions; and
Box 2: The role of civil society in the
FLEGT process in Cameroon
Civil society’s participation in the FLEGT process
grew from an observer role to direct involvement
in negotiations. They are now on the National
Monitoring Committee established by the VPA,
with six places out of 30. An important civil society
contribution was to highlight the plight of forest
dependent communities. As a result, the VPA
stipulates that:
‘In order to minimise any potential adverse effects
of the FLEGT licensing scheme on the indigenous
and local communities concerned, the parties
hereby agree to assess the impact of this
Agreement on their way of life‘ (VPA CameroonEU, Art 17-1).
• ensure government accountability to the
FLEGT process.
This project was developed by a group
of organisations already working on participatory mapping to establish a ‘ best
practice’ model for future environmental
monitoring by ILCs. These included CBOs,
NGOs, international organisations, and was
led by a private company, Helveta Ltd, a
UK-based software company with responsibility for timber traceability in Cameroon.3
Helveta wanted to develop a model for
community verification to use in conjunction with their timber traceability system.
The project team included five groups
of partners:
• Sixteen forest-dependent ILCs in southeast Cameroon. Project staff worked with
Bantu and Baka groups separately to avoid
discrimination. Communities collected
data and led in presenting it to other stakeholders.
• Five CBOs implemented the methodology and trained community members in
data collection, map reading and assisted
with data management.4 They organised a
network of project partners to support
1 See: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/forests/flegt.htm
2
Lewis (2012) reviews a number of these.
3 Helveta and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office co-funded the project as part of the
UK’s contribution to improving forest governance in line with VPA/FLEGT.
See http://corporate.helveta.com/products.html?pgid=97 for more details.
4 Association des Baka de l’Est (ASBAK); Centre pour l’environnement et le développement
(CED); Centre pour l’éducation et la formation pour l’appui aux initiatives de développement
(CEFAID); Okani; Organisation pour la Protection de l’Environnement, la Recherche et l’Appui
au Développement en Afrique (PERAD).