C ONCLUSIONS

6.1.1 Awareness, Perception and the Extent of Participation in JFM

The main stakeholders in the joint management of Dambwa Forest Reserve are the local communities around the forest reserve and the Forestry Department. All the local people interviewed valued the forest as a source of livelihood and more than a half of interviewed local people were aware of JFM and participated in JFM programme. Accordingly, it can be concluded that the increased understanding and awareness on participatory or joint forest management influenced participation of the local people in JFM and brought about change of attitude between the local people and the Forestry Department.

Local community members were involved in forest patrols, forest boundary maintenance and early forest burning. Local people’s participation in JFM was generally low, although FMC, VRMCs and FUG members were more involved than the general community members. Most local community members lost enthusiasm in the JFM programme due to lack of remuneration in cash or in kind for their involvement in JFM activities and the inability of the Forestry Department to devolve enough power and decision-making authority to the local communities. It can be

stated that individuals with membership in certain groups had greater involvement in JFM, but their involvement may not be sustainable in the continued absence of tangible benefits.

6.1.2 Factors Influencing People’s Participation in JFM

The study revealed that the Forestry Department still owns and controls Dambwa Forest Reserve, while local people are given the responsibilities to protect and management the forest reserve. The current legislation does not also clearly define access rights, user rights and equitable benefit sharing mechanisms. This implies that local people did not have decision-making power and tangible benefits, and their continued participation in JFM was not guaranteed.

Demographic variables such as age; gender; educational level; household size; and social position of the local people were found also to influence community participation in JFM programme. The results showed that older respondents did not participate in physical forest protection and management activities. The results also showed that women and younger respondents did not contribute to the JFM planning and implementation, implying that men and middle-aged community members dominated the programme. In addition, there was more involvement of individuals with formal education, implying that they may have better understanding of the developmental issues. However, this arrangement may lead to elitism, resulting in dominance and differential distribution of benefits that may be realized in a JFM project. On the other hand, the number of occupants in a household was also a factor that affected local people’s participation in JFM. Many households with fewer occupants did not participate in JFM programme as they preferred to utilize their scarce labour and time on other livelihood activities that would bring immediate benefits in comparison to JFM.

6.1.3. Performance of Local Management Institutions

The study showed that FMC and VRMCs were established at the forest area and village level, respectively, as local forest management and governance structures in

Dambwa JFM area. These institutions were established to coordinate the implementation of JFM activities. The role of traditional leaders was also recognized under the JFM arrangement - the local traditional chief was an ex-officio of FMC.

FMC was perceived to be more effective than the VRMCs. FMC leadership was considered to be stronger and committed compared to that of the VRMCs and this contributed to the effectiveness of FMC. However, all the user groups in the JFM area were not functional at the time of the study except the Mungongo oil group. Most of the user groups were expectant of support and regulation from the Forestry Department. It can be concluded that user groups are not yet fully empowered through the provision of regulations and support by the Forestry Department to enable different user groups to obtain economic benefits from JFM.

6.1.4 Effects of JFM on Local People’s Livelihoods

The study confirmed that agriculture was the most important livelihood activity among local people around Dambwa Forest Reserve, which involved crop farming and keeping livestock for home consumption and for sale. The Forest Reserve was also highly valued as it contributed significantly to local livelihoods through the provision of food, medicines, construction materials, firewood and other non-timber forest products. However, the study concluded that the JFM programme in Dambwa could not improve socio-economic conditions of local people, as the JFM arrangement did not provide sufficient and tangible benefits for households to improve their livelihoods.

6.1.5 Impact of JFM on the Dambwa Forest Reserve

The study showed that stocking in the forest reserve was low (219 SPH) and nearly all (90%) the stems were below 30cm DBH. The results signify that the forest area was heavily exploited in the past, prior to JFM, especially for the commercially valuable tree species of Baikiaea plurijuga, Pterocarpus angolensis, Guibourtia coleosperma, Afzelia quanzensis and Colophospermum mopane. However, the high number (almost 100,000) of saplings per hectare in Dambwa Forest Reserve, including some of the

selected commercial timber tree species seems to suggest that there is improved natural regeneration of the forest with increased forest protection activities due to the introduction of JFM.

6.1.6 Perceived Performance of the JFM Programme

The perception among local people was that JFM programme was not successful. This assertion among the local people was because there was no improvement in their livelihoods that could have been attributed to the JFM programme. However, the JFM programme managed to improve the conditions of the forest reserve through reduction in illegal forestry activities and improvement in natural forest regeneration. This implies that community participation in forest protection and management contributed to the improvement in general forest condition, but not the livelihoods at the household level.