Project Detail

Integrating biodiversity and sustainable income generating activities for poverty reduction on the Bamenda Highlands of Cameroon

The Bamenda Highlands are the north westerly part of the Western Highlands of Cameroon. These Highlands stretch from the Atlantic Ocean archipelago of Soa Tome, Principe and Bioko (Equatorial Guinea) and continue on the mainland through a range of mountains along the Cameroon-Nigeria border. Because of their unique diversity in flora and fauna, they have been classified by WWF as one of the 200 ecoregions of the world. However, the ecosystems on the Highlands are under intense threat due to unsustainable management which results in the fast disappearance of forests together with the benefits and services that they provide. It is estimated that 50% of the forest in the area above 1500m altitude, was lost between 1988 and 2003. What is left is found mainly in the most inaccessible parts of the highlands. Thus, the forest in Dom, the site of the project, is now a degraded wildlife sanctuary, situated on the Kedjosam region (15000 ? 2000m), within the coordinates (UTM, Zone 32): 676500, 704500; 680000, 704500; 676500, 701000; 680000,701000. The ecosystem and vegetation of the fragmented Dom forest (452ha) is submontane which, according to Harvey et al, (2006) ?is of very good ecological and conservation quality?. The forest contains numerous Red Data species that are new to science and restricted to Dom.

The Bamenda Highlands with a population of 1.9 million (2006 census) are described as resource poor and are said to be ranked as second poorest region in the country with 52.5% of the population living below the poverty line (Ingram et al, 2005). There is therefore no surprise that rural exodus especially of youths is one of the most disturbing problems in the Highlands. This situation is worse in the remote rural areas like Dom with inadequate social amenities and infrastructure. The population of Dom is about 3000 with 60% above 45 years and 25% of children below 10 years. Almost all the youths of both sexes have moved out to the big towns and cities. Dom is a dying village and any activity that can help bring income and improve the quality of the environment will help to sustain the village, particularly its few restive youths.

The forest at Dom has, for some years, been been considered as a community forest. In a community forest, forest management includes both forest conservation activities and sustainable use of natural resources. It is owned and managed by the local population that allow both conservation and sustainable use of natural resources in the forest. The greatest threat to the ecosystem of Dom forest is small scale agricultural practices which cumulatively become serious threat to the entire ecosystem. The farmers and grazers use slash and burn which is destructive to the environment. Worst still, they practice a local destructive system called ankara which kills soil micro-organisms and renders the top-soils susceptible to wind and gully erosion.

The aim of this project which will be implemented in an integrated and participatory manner, is to enhance the biodiversity of Dom forest by reforesting an existing degraded gap (61ha see map, page 4) mainly with threatened indigenous tree species selected from the red data list. The project will also plant 30.000 threatened tree species in the forest gap thereby greatly reducing the degree of threat on the targeted Red Data species in the highlands. Also, by closing the degraded forest gap with trees, the quality of wildlife habitat will improve. This will attract more wildlife leading to the enhancement of biodiversity. Tree planting will increase carbon sequestration and mitigate climate change and the resulting tree canopy will have direct impact on water retention and discharge, thus checking land degradation.

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Project Snapshot

Grantee:

Apiculture and Nature Conservation

Country:

Cameroon

Area Of Work:

Biodiversity
Biodiversity
Biodiversity

Operational Phase:

OP5-Y3 (Jul 13 - Jun 14)

Grant Amount:

US$ 31,919.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 7,704.00

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 13,988.00

Project Number:

CMR/SGP/OP5/Y3/STAR/BD/13/18

Start Date:

12/2013

End Date:

6/2015

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

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Project Characteristics and Results

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

ANCO projects are largely an integration of forest management that includes REDD+ and sustainable livelihoods that are supportive of conservation. The next one is apiculture which dovetails very well with conservation since conservation benefits apiculture and vice versa. Moreover, those who are involved in apiculture are ipso facto environmental protectionists against bush fire, deforestation and encroachment. ANCO promotes market gardening because one of the leading reasons for cutting down forests is to cultivate vegetables. Market gardens are set up in the homestead to practically demonstrate that vegetables do not necessarily need land that is forested to do well. Well manured beds around homes produce easily assessable, organic vegetables that are palatable and health supporting.

Capacity - Building Component

ANCO will provide training on Tree nursery, bee keeping for all communities' members. On Bee farming. The capacity of those who will volunteer to be trained will be built in hive construction, hive installation, honey harvesting, beeswax extraction and apiary management. This is a very valuable skill given that the area is quite suitable for honey production. 5.3. Market gardening. There is a local mentality that vegetables and cereals do well only in areas where forests have been cleared. The aim of this activity is to prove that this is not the case. That vegetables can be grown on any land that is well cultivated and fertilsed, in our case using organic manure locally produced, mostly chicken and pig droppings. Forest monitoring. In the first phase of the project, 6 forest monitors were trained on what to look for during periodic monitoring, how to record what is seen and what to do with what is recorded. At the moment only 3 of the 6 are still in the village. We will, during this second phase train 3 more. 5.5. Project skills. We will continue to provide practical training to members of the FMI on project monitoring, activity planning/leadership so that they continue to sit in the driver?s seat during periodic activity review and planning. We hope by the end of this phase, they should be capable of making simple project proposal to seek micro financing from embassies and other sources so that they may continue to carry out activities necessary for the sustainability of their project.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

Instead of indigenous people as opposed, to settlers, which is not applicable to the Dom community, we will treat the issue of minorities which is relevant to Dom. The Mbororos or Fulani cattle herders are permanently settled on Dom land and most of the destructions visited on the forest are by their cattle and their mode of cattle management. More so, over 80% of the fires that stray into the forest are either deliberately set by them or originate from the grazing areas they burn each year to regenerate grass for their cattle or kill ticks or other cow pests. In the past, since they live in the bush with their cattle, they were never involved in community projects. In Dom however, all of them are invited to participate. Of the 15 families, often between 10 and 12 respond. Since they are part of the problem they should be involved and participate in the execution and benefits. In the first phase of this project funded by IUCN/NL, they were assisted to establish plots for growing Bracharia and Quatamala for their cattle. 3.2. Other settlers are from ethnic groups of the region and these are just 10 persons who are fully integrated and unlike the Fulani are not discriminated against in the project activities.

Project sustainability

Project sustainability could be identified from 2 levels; at the level of the beneficiary community and at the level of the execution organisation her partners The sustainability strategies at the level of the beneficiary community included; vigorous capacity building/empowerment, strong community involvement, awareness raising and organisational support. The targeted beneficiaries with the community saw their capacities built and strengthened in many areas with serious follow-up and extension activities. Now the trainees are able to engage successfully in the different areas in which they were trained. They were further assisted with significant start-up material to ensure that there were not many difficulties to take up the practice. The community was highly involved in the different stages of the project. This is a major approach for the sustainability of the project. Several information and awareness raising meetings were embarked on and the need to consolidate the achievements. The women group that was created by the project built the capacities of the executive in financial/loan management with a strong organisational support. This key move will provide a long term solution to the Dom women through access to this facility for the improvement of their living condition. Sustainability strategy for ANCO and her partners involved capacity building in SGP financial management and reporting system and institutional support to ANCO. The capacity building on SGP justification and reporting procedure has improved greatly on the way finances are managed and justified in ANCO. Elements of good governance in the financial management system have been adopted by the organisation and have been proposed to the board for consideration as a policy. This will improve on the credibility of the organisation and the possibilities to secure more funding to continue assisting Dom and other communities. The project has also provided much equipment and other relevant support to assist ANCO in her numerous activities.

Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment

The Dom community being rural and mostly illiterate or semi-literate, the issue of raising their awareness of the global environment is limited to the practical issues of international waters and contribution to the mitigation of climate change. Also ANCO practice sensitazation, writing article on the project activities.

Gender Focus

There are 2 areas in which we pay special attention to equitability in gender: at the setting up of our project institutions: the FMI and sub committees, as well as during capacity building in various skills needed for project implementation. 6.1. The FMI. Elections into the FMI are moderated. After the election of the president by all, women come together and select 8 representatives, men select 9 and youths 7 making a total of 24 plus president = 25. These together with technicians involved in the project execution form the PET, (Project Execution Team) which meets every 2 months to review project execution and plan the next activities. Thus the women can influence decisions they strongly support if they align with the youths or girl members of the youth?s representatives in the FMI. Creation of sub committees. In the first phase of the project committees were created as follows: ? Agroforestry committee, responsible for follow up and promoting agroforestry. ? Bee farming committee for follow up/promotion of beefarming ? Market gardening committee that also follows up and promotes market gardening. It was hoped that these committees would evolve into common initiative groups. As a general rule, at least 1/3 of each committee has to be women. Two of the committees during the first phase were headed by women. So, the gender issue was adequately catered for and the women were generally pleased. This rule will be maintained during this second phase. Also during this phase, a special micro finance facility is to be created solely for women.

Project Results

*Training in nursery bed construction: The capacity of 30 members comprising 10 women and 20 men was built through practical activities. At the end of the demonstration followed by trainees practice, each of them could make a suitable bed for seed nursery. They will use the skill to lead members of their households to construct their household beds to nurse seeds in their back yards.
* Construction of nursery beds by individual households: A total of 105 beds constructed in various compounds instead of the 150 planned. This number was found to be sufficient to produce the targeted quantity of 30,000. For example, if each household produced 500 seedlings, total produced would be 52,500 seedlings.
* Quarter by quarter mobilization for seedling collection and transportation to planting site: The 21,000 seedlings produced were all transported to the forest, partly by vehicle and finally by head load.
* Tree planting done quarter by quarter to close up the 61ha degraded gap in the community forest: Of the 61ha planned, only around 40 ha were planted this period.

* Four (4) days of bee farming training including the procurement and distribution of startup materials: 30 people instead of 35 presented attended the training.

* Establishment of individual apiaries/supply of some materials: Bee hives, smokers and bee suits supplied to beneficiaries.

* Establishment of Dom Women?s Sustainable Development Fund: the women?s group was organized at the General Assembly of their meeting, 7 women were elected into the executive; the group was registered as the Dom Kintashi Women?s Group. A deposit of 1,000,000 FCFA was made in the women?s credit union?s bank account in Nkor. The executive of the group made up of 7 elected women was also trained in record and financial management at the Nkor Credit Union?s office.

- Annual income of 300,000 generated from sale of garden produce by trainees by May 2015
- Start-up materials distributed to 45 trainees including nursery construction material, seeds of carrot, huckleberry, tomatoes, leeks, onion, cabbage
- Training module prepared and distributed to all participants after training

- 30 trainees supplied with bee farming equipment that included bee suits, smokers and gloves. 50 hives of the 68 hives have been colonized

In general the main project output are:

*** The capacity building programme of the project saw the training of 30 community member (10 women and 20 men) in the nursery establishment and care with the provision of polythene pots and seeds of threatened species that included Eugenia gilgii, Psychotria moseskemei, Newtonia camerunensis, Oxyanthus okuensis, Eugenia ujori, Chassalia liakomensis, Prunus africana to begin tree nurseries. It further built the capacity of 30 women in beefarming and supported trainees with beefarming equipment. The trainees produced and installed 68 hives after the training. 45 women were also trained in market gardening with sufficient support in seeds and fencing material for them to establish garden plots.

*** A mobilization campaign was carried out in all the quarters in Dom to participate in the tree planting activity and this resulted in the restoration of more than 61ha of degraded forest that extended between some of the forest patches.

O*** 30 and 45 women were trained in beefarming and market gardening respectively. These trainees have increase significant honey and garden goods production in Dom village by over 50%. There exists a honey sales point in Dom and operated by a woman.

*** All the requirement for the application file for community forest have been completed and the application file submitted to the Divisional Delegation of MINFO, Kumbo, Bui Division

*** A microfinance facility called Women Sustainable Development Fund put in place with SGP resource supports women trained in beekeeping and market gardening
A women?s group has been legalized and an endowment fund of 1,000,000XAF credited into the group?s account to support the members in their beefamring and market gardening activities.

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Indicators

Biophysical

Hectares of globally significant biodiversity area protected or sustainably managed by project 61

Empowerment

Number of women participated / involved in SGP project 30

Biophysical

Hectares of land sustainably managed by project 550

Livehood

Number of households who have benefited* from SGP project 50

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