Fisheries in the Southern Border Zone of Takamanda - Impact ...

1 Introduction
Fisheries in the Southern Border Zone of
Takamanda Forest Reserve, Cameroon
Marina Mdaihli, Tim du Feu, and Julius S. O. Ayeni
The Cameroonian–German (GTZ) Project for the
Protection of Forests Around Akwaya (PROFA)
collaborates with local communities and authorities to
achieve community-based conservation 1 . This approach
aims to maintain the biological diversity of Takamanda
Forest Reserve (TFR) and improve the forest-based
living conditions of local peoples.
In the course of collecting baseline data for planning
sustainable resource use in TFR, fishing was found to
contribute as much as game hunting to consumption and
the trading economy of villages within and around the
Reserve (du Feu 2002). Yet, forest managers concentrate
on the generation of revenue from timber and wildlife
harvests. Within the context of formulating a sustainable
management plan for TFR, it therefore was necessary to
provide baseline scientific information on fish biology
and on the economic benefits of fisheries in the TFR area.
This paper reports on fisheries of the southern border
zone of the Reserve, based on a fisheries baseline study
undertaken from 23 October-3 December, 2000, under
commission by PROFA. Information from the study and
baseline socio-ecological data (Ayeni and Mdaihli 2001,
1 Community-based conservation attempts to move the
responsibility for natural resource management from the elite
to the rural poor and from the urban to the village hamlets.
This approach is focused on the people who live with and
directly bear the costs of natural resource conservation. It
enables local people to define their own priorities and
develop at their own pace and in their own way—gaining
knowledge and skills as they go (Uphoff 1985). In an ideal
situation, community-based conservation arises within a
community rather than being imposed through a top-down
external force.
Schmidt-Soltau 2001) are being used to draft a
participatory plan for sustainable management of TFR
forests.
1.1 PROFA
PROFA is administered by the Divisional Delegation for
Environment and Forests (Manyu Division at Mamfe),
an agency of the Ministry of Environment and Forestry
in Yaoundé. The overall goal during the first phase of the
PROFA (March 2000 to February 2003) was to develop
a management plan that ensures the maintenance of
biodiversity in TFR and contributes to improvement of
living conditions for people within the Reserve’s border
zones. A positive outcome of the first phase will enable
expansion of the project to cover the nearby Mone Forest
Reserve and extension of the timeframe to 12 years
(three-year orientation, eight-year implementation phase,
and a “handing over” phase of one year).
The following are the anticipated project outputs:
• Draft forest management plan for TFR, partially
tested.
• Participatory forest management capacity of local
populations and the Divisional Delegation is
strengthened through cooperation among all
involved parties.
• Traditional income-generating activities and selfhelp
initiatives are identified, and a gender-sensitive
strategy for sustainable resource management is
developed and tested.
2 Site description
Chapter 10
The Reserve is situated at the northern most corner of
Southwest Province, Cameroon, north of the Cross River
SI/MAB Series #8, 2003, Pages 141 to 154