Institutional Change and Compliance in Forest Landscape Restoration Governance: Insights from the Western Highlands of Cameroon

Figures & data

Figure 1. Analytical framework of the study [adapted from Koning (2016), Orozco (2019), Owusu et al. (2023), Shvetsova (2003), Vallino (2014), and Yeboah-Assiamah et al. (2017)].

Figure 2. The map of the Western Highlands of Cameroon showing the study communities.

Figure 3. The data collection chart.

Figure 4. Typologies of institutions that shape rural Cameroon’s FLR.

Figure 5. Evolution of key exogenous institutions and major policy directions linked to Cameroon’s FLR.

Table 1. Evolution of endogenous institutions linked to FLR in rural Cameroon.

Endogenous FLR-liked institutions		Communities
		Bana		Babadjou		Penka Michel
Typologies of institutions	Institutions	Past era	Recent times	Past era	Recent times	Past era	Recent times
Endogenous informal	Traditional council	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Belief system linked to gods/ancestral spirits’ control of sacred trees/forests	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Communal sacred forests and taboos	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Taboos on trees	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Practice of families owning sacred forests	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Engrained agroforestry culture	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Custom of planting and protecting peace plants and trees for twin children	X	X	X	X	X	X
	Practice of protecting baobab trees	X		X		X
	Tradition of planting and protecting raffia palms	X		X		X
Endogenous formal	Tree-planting practice of common initiative groups		X		X		X
	Environmental management initiative of community environment management committee						X
	Tree-planting programme of Christian women’s group						X
	Community-GIZ collaborative tree-planting initiative				X

NB: X indicates the presence of the particular endogenous FLR-related institution.

Table 2. Typologies of FLR-related institutions and their compliance levels.

Typologies of institutions	Key FLR-linked regulations, provisions, policy objectives, action principles, or strategies		Compliance levels of institutions in communities
			Bana	Babadjou	Penka Michel
Exogenous formal institutions	Forestry, Wildlife and Fisheries law	Authorisation to plant and own private forest	+	+	+
		Protecting and reserving trees for purposes of regeneration	–	–	–
		Obtaining authorisation before cutting poles/trees	–	–	–
		Sanctions for engaging in illegal logging or destruction of planted trees	–	–	–
	Decree on forests system	Demarcating degraded areas as fragile ecology areas and closing them to human activities	±	±	±
	Environmental management law	Creation and management of forest reserves to ensure biodiversity conservation and protection	+	+	+
		Public education on ecologically efficient land use methods	±	±	±
	National tree-planting programme	Subsidies to entities for engaging in tree-planting	na	na	na
		Allocation of funds for forest restoration	+	+	+
	Manual of community forestry	Using agroforestry to restore non-permanent forests for community forestry purposes	–	–	–
		Reforestation compulsory in timber and fuel wood production community forests	–	–	–
	AFR100 restoration commitment	Transform areas of deforested and degraded lands into resilient and multifunctional ecosystems	–	–	–
	National plantation forests development programme	Distributing seedlings and supporting the establishment of private nurseries	±	±	±
		Supporting the creation and development of council, community and private plantation forests/agroforests	±	±	±
		Forestry training and capacity building of actors	±	±	±
	National Strategic framework for FLR	Adopt land use policies and laws conducive to FLR	–	–	–
		Promote equitable stakeholder participation during FLR planning and implementation	±	±	±
		Develop a mechanism to raise awareness and share knowledge on FLR	±	±	±
		Strengthen the integration of research and local knowledge in FLR	±	±	±
	Community-led landscape management programme		±	±	na
Exogenous informal institutions	The Raffia Palm Plantation initiative		±	±	±
Endogenous formal institutions	Tree-planting practice of common initiative groups		+	+	+
	Environmental management initiative of community environment management committee		na	na	+
	Tree-planting programme of Christian Women’s group		na	na	+
	Community-GIZ collaborative tree-planting initiative		na	+	na
Endogenous informal institutions	Belief system linked to gods/ancestral spirits’ control of sacred trees/forests		+	+	+
	Communal sacred forests and taboos		+	+	+
	Taboos on trees		+	+	+
	Engrained agroforestry culture		+	+	+
	Practice of families owning sacred forests		+	+	na
	Custom of planting and protecting peace plants and ‘trees for twin children’		+	+	+
	Practice of protecting baobab trees		+	+	+
	Tradition of planting and protecting raffia palms		±	±	±

NB: All policy provisions or policy objectives that were recorded across multiple policies or laws were harmonised and duplicates deleted; + refers to full compliance of community members and state entities with the particular institution, ± refers to partial compliance; – refers to non-compliance; na = not applicable (data was not obtained to guide the determination of compliance level).

Table

Major policy directions on FLR	Years	Policy provisions, objectives, action principles, or strategies
Focusing only on forest plantations for FLR	1988	Ensure the regeneration of forest resources through forest plantations establishment [objective 4 of the Tropical Forestry Action Plan of Cameroon]
Using natural/artificial regeneration, tree-planting (agroforestry or plantation forestry) for FLR	1994 1995 1996 2009	Authorisation to plant and own private forest [section 39(1) of the Forest, Wildlife, and Fisheries Law, 1994] Protecting and reserving trees for purposes of regeneration [section 43 of the Forest, Wildlife, and Fisheries Law, 1994] Forest activities should ensure re-afforestation and natural or artificial regeneration [sections 23&63 of of the Forest, Wildlife, and Fisheries Law, 1994] Authorisation required before cutting poles or trees [section 54 of the Forest, Wildlife, and Fisheries Law, 1994] Sanctions for engaging in illegal logging or destruction of planted trees sections 154&156 of the Forest, Wildlife, and Fisheries Law, 1994) Demarcating reforestation areas as landscapes of national importance [articles 2(1,2), 3(7) of the Decree on Forests System of 1995] Demarcating degraded areas as fragile ecology areas and closing degraded forests to human activities [articles 6(3,14), 10(1,2) of the Decree on Forests System of 1995] Undertaking regeneration programmes to restore degraded forests [article 45 of the Decree on Forests System of 1995] Creation and management of ecologically protected areas or natural reserves to ensure biodiversity conservation and protection [article 64(2,3) of the Environmental Management Law of 1996] Public education on ecologically efficient land use methods [article 68(1,2) of the Environmental Management Law of 1996] Using agroforestry to restore non-permanent forests for community forestry purpose [section 1.3.1 of the Manual on Community Forestry, 2009] Reforestation compulsory in timber and fuel wood production community forests [section 1.5.1 of the Manual on Community Forestry, 2009]
FLR financing & incentives	2006 2017 2019	Allocation of funds for forest restoration to provide subsidies to entities for engaging in tree-planting [objective of the National Tree-Planting Programme, 2006] Increase capacities and resources to restore degraded and deforested landscapes [objective of the AFR100 commitment, 2017] Transform degraded landscape into resilient and multifunctional ecosystems [objective of the AFR100 commitment, 2017] Distributing seedlings and supporting the establishment of private nurseries [Action principle of the National Plantation Forests Development Programme, 2019] Supporting the creation and development of council, community and private plantation forests/agroforests [Action principle of the National Plantation Forests Development Programme, 2019]
Human-centred FLR	2019 2020	Mobilising the various social actors for FLR and training and building their capacity [Action principle of the National Plantation Forests Development Programme, 2019] Assess needs based on challenges and building technical capacity for FLR [objective 3.3 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Promote equitable stakeholder participation during FLR planning and implementation [objective 2.4 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Develop a mechanism to raise awareness and share knowledge on FLR [objective 3.2 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020]
Promoting research in FLR	2019 2020	Supporting research and innovation [Action principle of the National Plantation Forests Development Programme, 2019] Strengthen the integration of research and local knowledge in the implementation of FLR [objective 5.1 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020]
Intensifying FLR financing mechanisms	2020	Engage the support of bilateral and multilateral donors [objective 4.2 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Encourage the private sector and promote the development of FLR related value chains [objective 4.3 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Facilitating investment in FLR at the local level [objective 4.4 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020]
Attention on FLR institutional issues	2020	Adopt land use policies and laws conducive to FLR [objective 1.4 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Ensure that FLR is coherent with adopted development strategies and programmes [objective 2.1 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Develop and maintain integrated and cross-sectoral FLR planning [objective 2.2 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020] Increase the contribution of ministries in the scaling up of FLR [objective 4.1 of the National Strategic Framework for FLR, 2020]
Adoption of traditional knowledge	2021	Promote genetic resources conservation and use using traditional knowledge [section 2(a) of the Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge Law, 2021] Involve local communities in the benefits arising from the use of genetic resources or associated traditional knowledge [section 2(c) of the Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge Law, 2021]

Table

Compliance with exogenous formal institutions ‘Individuals in the community have engaged in restoration or tree-planting activities. One of the community members has about 2,000 ha of forest plantation. Many community members also have such forest plantations’ —- EI5_SGPKMC

‘I have a forest plantation on a portion of my land. Nobody goes into my forest to cut trees without my permission’ —- KII21_BANNO

Non-compliance or partial compliance with exogenous formal institutions ‘Many people might be interested in planting more trees on their lands, but not everyone has a land title that can let them plant trees on the land. It is impossible to plant trees on people’s lands or a land that does not belong to you. … about 80% of the communities’ members do not have a land title, making it difficult for these people to get external support and funding to assist in tree-planting … . government should facilitate the acquisition of land titles since this would grant the people the authority to plant trees on the land’ —- EI1_ MINFOF

‘The State gives a land title and space for farming. So, if the State does not give us the land title and enough land area, how do they expect us to plant trees on our limited land?’ —- FGD2_PKMMXG

‘When we plant trees, some people spray the newly planted tree seedlings with herbicides to kill these trees’ —- EI1_ MINFOF

‘The destruction of planted trees by the people has become a social phenomenon, so it is difficult for the State to coerce the people to stop the destruction of the trees. So, nothing serious is done to those people’ EI1_ MINFOF

‘This law (obtaining authorisation before cutting poles or trees), in one way or the other, applies to only the protection of eucalyptus plants. MINFOF delegates are only interested in the eucalyptus plants. There is virtually no law enforcement on the other trees in the community. When people cut any other tree apart from the eucalyptus trees in the community, it looks like nothing happens to those people. Aside from this, some forestry staff are easily influenced to bend law enforcement regarding tree harvesting’ —- KII15_BBJMN

‘ … if the forestry staff sees the person cutting the trees without a permit, the offender will give out some little money to the forestry staff, and that ends the enforcement process’ —- FGD10_BBJYHG

‘We have an FLR programme titled, Community-led Landscape Management (COBALAM). The COBALAM programme is an FLR programme that includes several communities and actors of which Babadjou is one of the relevant ones’ —- EI6_SGBBJC

‘It would be good to form a locally-led joint committee that involves the community members, chiefs, and external government agencies to restore the degraded forest landscape’ — FGD9_BBJMXG

‘I recommend collaboration between the traditional council, the local community members, the council members, and all external agencies’ —- KII4_PKMQM

‘We believe a collaboration between chiefs, the community members, the council, the ministries and NGOs are the right way to help restore the degraded forest landscape’ —- FGD13_BANMXG

Partial compliance with exogenous informal institutions ‘MINFOF unofficially discusses with and offers training to the community people in the protection, growth and management of Raffia palms for their livelihood support’ —- EI1_ MINFOF

‘Individuals in the community sometimes plant the Raffia palms on farms or lands’ —- FGD7_BBJMNG

‘ … the current generation has lost some interest in the planting of Raffia palms’ —- KII5_PKMQH

‘The people are also refusing to plant the Raffia palms because they think it occupies a lot of space of their already limited land area that they use for agricultural purposes’ —- EI1_MINFOF

Compliance with endogenous formal FLR-linked institutions ‘Yes, we (Christian women’s group) plant trees because our church has a piece of land, and we have also been admonished to plant trees on our land. So, planting trees is already in our programme’ —- FGD5_PKMWNG

‘There is a common initiative group in the community. This common initiative group is into planting fruit trees and eucalyptus trees in the community’ —- KII18_BANMN

Compliance with endogenous informal institutions ‘There is an area known as the sacred forest where no one is allowed to enter. It is forbidden for anyone to enter. The people of this community still respect the taboos regarding entry into sacred forests. This act has not changed over the years’ —- KII3_PKMYH

‘We, the Bamiléké people, are very tight to our traditions. Even our tradition is first before we consider anything about Jesus Christ. We, therefore, maintain and guide our culture. The current reverence for our traditional culture is just as it used to be in previous times’ —- FGD11_BANMNG

‘When you disobey the traditions and customs of the community, something bad might happen to you than what can be addressed physically … . we have been told that if we do not go according to the community’s customs, something very bad will happen to us. The fear of the unknown thing that might happen to us for flouting those customary laws pushes us away from breaking those laws. However, for the state laws, we know the punishment, and we can manoeuvre our ways in such a way that we might not be caught to face that punishment; but who can run away from or hide from the punishment of the gods and the ancestors of the community…? Hence the reason why we respect the traditional laws more than the external or state laws’ —- FGD10_BBJYHG

‘Those who do that (i.e. disobey the community traditions) incur curses unto their children even if those people do not directly get the punishment for their activities from the gods or ancestors’ —- KII17_BANWN

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