Eastern Africa Coastal Forest Programme: Regional Workshop ...

EASTERN AFRICAN COASTAL FOREST PROGRAMME
REGIONAL WORKSHOP REPORT
NAIROBI
FEBRUARY 4 -7 2002
1. BACKGROUND
The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has singled out the Eastern African
Coastal forest for conservation because of its richness in biodiversity,
because it is one of Africa’s centres of endemism, and due to the intense
threats to the survival of forest habitats in the area. Threats to the Eastern
African Coastal Forests are and continue to be linked to conversion to
farmland, fragmentation, settlement, changes in land-use patterns and lack of
effective and integrated policies, coupled with inadequate / ineffective
management structures. Current forest destruction trends are impacting on a
wide range of terrestrial and marine resources in the three countries covered
under the programme. For example, the sustainable production potentials and
the services they provide to the local livelihoods continue to decline.
WWF’s commitment to addressing these threats is manifested by its past and current
projects in Kenya (Kaya forest project in collaboration with NMK and most recently
with the Ford Foundation), Tanzania (Lowland Coastal Forest Project) and in
Mozambique (Bazzaruto National Park).
Two major lessons have been learned from these projects. First, conservation
interventions require active support from political institutions, local communities and
forest management authorities. Secondly, coastal forest conservation and sustainable
management problems require an integrated approach involving partnership building
between local and central government, private sector and donors institutions through
short and long-term landscape level approaches.
In order to address these issues effectively, it was felt that conservation of the Eastern
African Coastal Forests should happen within a coherent framework, developed with
partners and stakeholders. Short-term approaches would aim at addressing sustainable
management and conservation issues through scaled-up project activities in to a
programme. Long-term approaches would aim at addressing socio-economic
problems impacting on rural livelihoods and biodiversity, national and trans-boundary
policy issues and mechanisms for a sustainable financing system.
In order to initiate the regional partnership-based coastal forest programme, WWF
Eastern African Regional Programme Office (WWF-EARPO) held a workshop with
stakeholders from Kenya, Mozambique and Tanzania in February 2002. This report
contains the findings of that workshop.
2. PURPOSE OF WORKSHOP
The purpose of the workshop was to deliberate on the three countries national coastal
forest resource issues, extent and status and deliver a regional synthesis with a view
to contribute to the programme’s planning processes. Further, the workshop was
Eastern Africa Coastal Forests - 7 - Workshop Report, Nairobi February 4-7 2002