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| Environmental Issues In the Northwest, West and Southwest Provinces, natural landslides are becoming more prevalent because human activity in the mountains. Due to unsustainable farming systems and population density, rural communities have begun to farm steep areas of the highlands, most of which are considered marginal lands. Farmers who grow their food and cash crops here are often extremely poor and have been pushed out of the fertile countryside. These men and women are removing the last remnant forest vegetation and leaving the mountainsides more vulnerable to erosion. The consequences of this have been dire. The removal of productive forest has resulted in substantial loss of biodiversity and native plant and animal habitat, as well as resulted in loss of life and property for marginalized rural communities. These mountainous areas threatened by landslides correspond with critical habitat that includes endemic plant and animal life and important watersheds. The Western Cameroon Highlands hails over 900 bird species, 50 of which are endemic to the Afromontane highlands, and 15 which are globally threatened. The Bamenda Highlands to the north are the only place on earth the Bannerman's Turaco and Banded Wattle-eye bird species are found. Endangered primates such as chimpanzee, drill and gorilla also live in the forested highlands, and are extremely sensitive human development and habitat fragmentation. These animal species depend in large part on the watersheds that give rise to life-giving rivers, such as the Cross River in the Southwest Province. |
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| Social Issues Cameroon's population is over 18 million people, of which over fifty percent is rural. Nearly fifty-six percent of the population is living in poverty. The majority of the people live in or around the country's 22 million hectares of forest. The people living in these areas are dependent on the forest resources for their livelihoods. Most of the wood harvested in Cameroon's forests is used to meet local energy needs. However, over 80% of the forests are under some type of allocation to the timber companies, as the logging industry forms a large portion of the backbone of Cameroon's economy. Therefore, the heavy degradation resulting from the industrial logging taking place in Cameroon often conflicts with the livelihoods of the local people. However, following numerous policy reforms in the mid-1990s, Cameroon has moved towards a more equitable system of sharing its natural resources. |
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| Our Response TFTF's Cameroon Program is newly revived after a seven-year hiatus. We started working with 60 farmer groups in the Northwest Province in the early 1990s and they have planted nearly 170,000 trees in the Kumbo area to date. Our new Cameroon Field Representative, Louis Nkembi, is now working with local NGOs in the West, Northwest and Southwest Provinces on tree-planting activities including alley cropping and live fencing. After Mr. Nkembi distributed seed to these groups in early 2007, over 200,000 seedlings were planted. |
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| Program Update | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Spring 2009 |
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TFTF Cameroon Program in 2009 will continue to focus its attention in the Western Highlands of Cameroon (in the Provinces of South West, West and North West). In 2009, TFTF Cameroon is placing its emphasis on development of agro-forestry technologies on farmers' fields, capacity building and effective monitoring at three levels namely the TFTF Cameroon Program level, NGOs and Farmers' Networks. TFTF Cameroon will also initiate formal collaboration with Municipalities in the Western Highlands region facing critical watershed management problems. Many of these Municipalities have been identified in 2008. In this region we will continue to identify and focus on impoverished farmers and households. |
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Winter 2008 |
In 2008, Louis worked throughout the 3 Provinces holding numerous meetings and agroforestry trainings with farmers, schools, NGOs, and community groups. He disseminated large quantities of tree seeds, helped establish tree nurseries and planted over 2 million trees this year with over 2000 farmers! In addition, Trees for the Future is developing a School Forest Garden program and are currently working with 8 schools in the Southwest Province. On a recent trip, Africa Program Manager, Ethan Budiansky, had the opportunity to visit many of the projects and meet the farmers. He was impressed by their dedication and enthusiasm to improve their environment and their livelihoods through the planting of trees. The farmer's projects are quite diverse throughout the three provinces both in the agroforestry technologies implemented and the number of trees planted. For example, in the Western province a number of farmers are planting Calliandra calothyrus, Acacia angustisimma, and Leucaena leucocephala as alley cropping and for the production of animal fodder. In the Southwest and Northwest Province, Sesbania sesban and other species are being planted with bee boxes to develop apiculture businesses. Throughout all three provinces, trees are being planted within fields and along hillsides to increase soil fertility and decrease soil erosion. |
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| Trees for the Future | P.O. Box 7027 | Silver Spring, MD 20907 | 1.800.643.0001 or 1.301.565.0630 | Skype: treesftf
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