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Harvesting timber: New regulations require community participation, commitment
2005-08-17 08:30:09
By Editor
Last week the government announced that it had lifted its ban on the harvesting of natural forests imposed in July, last year.
In a statement issued by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, the government said it had okayed the harvesting of natural forests in Rufiji District, Coast Region, Handeni in Tanga Region and Kilwa in Lindi Region effective last Monday. Curbs in other districts are to be lifted on September 1, this year.
The suspension was intended to curb the illegal harvesting of forest products that had become rampant in almost the whole country.
The booming trade in export of unprocessed logs was said to be behind the trade in which laid-down rules and regulations were scarcely followed.
The government had also wanted to get time to review the then existing regulations that governed the business that were being flouted with impunity.
Ironically, it was evident at that time that the ministry’s employees who were supposed to enforce the laws, rules and regulations that guide the sustainable harvesting of natural resources were among the offenders.
The decision to impose the ban drew a lot of criticism from many quarters, including traders, loggers, transporters and labourers, all of whom earned their living from the business.
But that had to be. As a nation, we could not afford to think of only today and therefore extract all the forest resources to satisfy our current needs.
We had to think of the future generations and so set up regulations that would ensure sustainable consumption of forest resources.
It is for this reason that we commend the government for lifting the ban and thus enabling Tanzanians to benefit from their natural resources.
More importantly, we would like to congratulate the government for putting in place measures that ensure sustainable harvesting of natural resources.
The new regulations also give districts the mandate to issue permits to prospective traders in timber and unprocessed logs while the district forest offices would issue licences to the same.
This seems to be a good arrangement, particularly when one looks at the need for the government to collect all the revenue accruing from natural resources.
Yet we think that there is a gapping hole in the new arrangement. Unless there are other details that the Ministry has not divulged to the public, the new system leaves communities, and village governments in particular, in the cold.
The communities that live around natural forests are responsible for their protection and conservation and should subsequently benefit from that huge responsibility.
In fact, they are the ones who know the secrets of the forests and who does what and when in these natural resources. Leaving them completely out of the picture may only lead them to engage in illegal harvesting of forest products.
We would also like to register our fears here about the effectiveness of the new system. How is the government prepared to enforce the new regulations?
We draw our pessimism from a similar situation that happened in December 2003 when the government suspended the harvesting of natural forests in order to introduce new regulations that would bring about sustainable harvesting.
A month later when the ban was lifted, we expressed our concern that the government did not give itself enough time to review the situation.
We were not surprised when the ban was re-enforced five months later.
We do not doubt the government’s good intention to protect our forest resources.
What we would like to caution here, however, is that these new measures require unwavering commitment from the officials responsible so as to function effectively.
Allowing communities and village governments to participate in the whole process of conservation and sustainable harvesting of natural forests would make the new regulations more effective.
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