The world’s forests are precious resources for all of us. In recent times, the forest’s importance in mitigating global climate change has been well documented. Forests also contribute to regulating and cleaning water supplies, preventing soil erosion and providing us with all kinds of benefits, such as food and medicine.
The importance of forests in the production of timber and pulp is well recognized in a country like Sweden, where much of the export income comes from forests. However, there are many people around the world for whom access to a forest may be a means of survival. This particularly applies to those living in regions with widespread poverty.
Many of them have been living close to forests for generations, without ever having been granted formal ownership of or usufruct (the legal right of using or profiting from something belonging to another) rights over the natural resources they have been using. It is rather customary law that determines who has the right to collect wood, practise hunting, gather food, look for fuel, fetch water or feed for cattle.
For landless people, common forested areas might be the only accessible natural resource from which to gather fuel and perhaps honey, fruit or other foodstuffs. For those who have access to arable land, the forest might serve as an extra resource in the event of a bad harvest.
Important to sell goods
In order for the use of forests and other natural resources to form the basis of economic development, those who use them must receive payment for what they gather, manufacture or repair. With this money they can then buy the things they cannot produce themselves.
To maintain this development in the long term, the resources must also be handled and managed in a way that is sustainable. This includes both how these resources are used in a practical sense, as well as how a society chooses to manage its resources.
These issues have become all the more complex in recent years as forests have been granted increasing importance with regard to the Earth’s climate. The importance of forests has become all the more obvious in relation to everything from cleaning and regulating water supplies to reducing the amount of green house gases released into the atmosphere, not to mention all the plants and animals that are dependent on the world’s forests.
Another indication that there is an awareness of forests’ significance in relation to the climate is that the rich countries of the world are now paying those with few resources to stop deforestation.
Sida contributes to securing provisions for those most vulnerable
Sweden and Sida are contributing in many ways to promoting the long-term sustainable usage of forests to help secure vulnerable people’s chances of providing for themselves by using the forest’s resources in the long term.
For example, this might include helping to increase the income they receive from forest products. It might also cover supporting methods for sustainable forestry at the local level. Sida might also choose to contribute by funding programmes aimed at raising the competence of the authorities and institutions concerned in the partner country.
One important part of this involves sharing knowledge about the importance of forests in combating poverty – for example, through dialogue with the relevant authorities and decision makers. Many of the programmes that Sida supports are about decentralizing the management of forest resources and, in such a way, increasing the benefits to the local population.
A more common way of strengthening people’s influence over local forest resources is to secure their right by law to use them and arrive at decisions on how they should be used. A local, common responsibility for natural assets combined with small-scale usage, where villagers decide on the rules for how they are to be used, have in many cases turned out to be a successful way of utilizing forest resources sustainably.
Under the right conditions, this can also be an effective method of promoting local economic development. However, a prerequisite for this is that those using the resources not only own or have usufruct rights, but that they also have the ability to handle the cultivation, transport and sales and to get well paid – or to negotiate good contracts with forestry companies who can manage this.
Support to authorities and institutions
Sida can supply capacity support and other development assistance to authorities and institutions whose task is to regulate people’s access to forests and other natural resources in a variety of ways, particularly with the help of laws and guidelines.
Sida also supports both international and national organizations that can promote economic development in Sweden’s partner countries. This might include raising awareness globally, or efforts in the area concerned.
This is a real challenge because it is not only about managing natural resources, but also about establishing local democratic forums with the task of deciding how the common resources will be used.
