|
Abstract:
|
"In the precolonial period. pastoralists usually had customary control of forest areas and resources in Sahelian Africa. As colonies were established, traditional usage was swept aside and colonial forest law was modelled on the forest laws of the colonizers' own countries. The assumption of state ownership of 'vacant and ownerless land' amounted to a form of expropriation. with responsibility for management of the rural population's land and its resources being taken out of its hands. The state then set up a forestry service entrusted with forest surveillance and management. Official attitudes are still heavily influenced by this approach, and each forester sees his or her task as that of ensuring steady timber yields, while protecting forests from outside aggression. This has led to the development and adoption of a model of forest management that recognizes only one actor in forest management (the state), and concentrates on managing the timber resource, despite the fact that grazing, game, gathered grass, etc., are often explicitly listed as forest products in forestry laws in Sahelian countries."
|