Achieving Cameroon’s Biodiversity Conservation Target; More Haste Less Speed

Cameroon is undoubtedly one of the richest countries in Africa in term of biological diversity. Statistics from the World Conservation Monitoring Centre indicates that the country is host to some 1661 known species of amphibians, birds, mammals, and reptiles and at least 8260 species of vascular plants distributed across its over 21,245,000 hectares of forest land.

Cognizant of the veritable role of the forest and its resources in the socio-economic development of the country, the Cameroon Government has since 1974 developed and or ratified a number of policies, laws and regulatory frameworks geared towards ensuring forest protection and biodiversity conservation.

Most of these policies and regulatory frameworks, which have turned out to be the modus operandi for the sustainable management of the country’s natural resources were a culmination of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. The immediate step by the Cameroon Government after the Summit was the creation of the Ministry of Environment and Forestry in 1992, two years later, what is simply known today as the 1994 Forestry Law was enacted to regulate wildlife, forest resources, and fisheries. To further demonstrate her steadfastness in the protection of her forest resources, Government in 1996 created the National Environment Management Plan (NEMP) aimed at ensuring that at least 30 % of the national territory is covered by permanent forests. Here again, the country is also making great strides with over 33 protected areas created and over 22 % of the national territory already covered by permanent forests.

Government’s efforts in the sustainable management of Cameroon’s over 33 protected areas is still really epileptic heightening anthropogenic threats, which are eaten deep into the fabric of these protected areas that if urgent actions are not taken, the country will be left with protected areas that have very little or nothing to show for in term of forest resources.

Firstly, the management plan, which is supposed to state clearly the purpose of the protected area and what it needs to achieve to fulfill that purpose either comes several years after the creation of the protected area or is not even produced at all. We have the  Kilum Ijum Plant Life Sanctuary in the Northwest Region which is at the level of drafting a letter to the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife to initiate the process of establishing a management plan 13 years after creation; the Tofala Hill Wildlife Sanctuary created since 2014 still en route to establishing a management plan; the Kimbi Fungom National Park created in 2015 and a host of others.

Even when national and international conservation organizations step in to assist the Government to facilitate the process, administrative bottlenecks and the slowness of the government machinery still stifles their efforts. For example, the Conservator of the Tofala Hill Wildlife Sanctuary in collaboration with the Environment and Rural Development Foundation (ERuDeF) and her international partners submitted a letter to the Minister of Forestry and Wildlife last April, 2017 requesting the putting in place of a technical committee for the elaboration and validation of a Management Plan for Tofala. This committee was put in place last week, five months after.

Also, law enforcement in and around the protected areas created by the government still leaves much to be desired. Ecoguards dispatched to ensure law enforcement within these protected areas are not only limited in supply relative to the surface area of the protected areas but are also not well equipped.

We have the Tofala Hill Wildlife Sanctuary with a surface area of 8000hecatres with only nine Forest Guards. This protected area is surrounded by some 11 villages who have access into the area making it difficult for any effective law enforcement to be carried out. In a chat with the Conservator of the Mount Cameroon National Park recently, he hinted that the park covers 58,178 hectares cutting across 41 villages with about three to five inlets with a 130 km boundary. This according to him, needs over 500 eco-guards to guard entry into the park, a venture the conservator said is virtually impossible.

Discussing with  some Eco-guards on patrol at the Chimpanzee Camp in the Korup National Park a few years ago  they explained that “as guards on patrol, we are on a war front and can be attacked at any time; the poachers are our enemy but most of them like the elephant hunters,  have very sophisticated guns and are brutal…but see us; a group of persons on patrol in a class ‘A’ park in Cameroon with one gun produced since 1939-during the Second World War…how do we face such a situation?  Look at the recent elephants killing in the Bouba Ndjida National Park; if Eco-guards were well armed such destruction would not have taken place. The government has given us the best of training but has failed to equip us; you can’t send somebody to the war front without weapons!”

This and the none provision of alternative sources of livelihood to forest adjacent communities have left many critics wondering if Cameroon is really serious about placing 30% of its territory as permanent forest or simply joking?

B. Shancho Ndimuh