Managing the Miombo Woodlands of Southern Africa - PROFOR

iggest challenge for the region’s forest organizations is the need to move from their earlier roles,
which were largely regulatory, to roles that have a much stronger service-delivery orientation, aligned
with the poverty mitigation agenda. The skill set that currently characterizes forest organizations in the
miombo region, and the budget processes that allocate public resources for forest management, is
largely not relevant for meeting the challenges of management. Similarly, with only a few exceptions,
forest research institutions have demonstrated a limited understanding of the complexities of
management to meet local needs. It may be that the current roles of forest organizations need to be
greatly reduced to focus on a few strategic themes, and that wider responsibilities for service delivery
should shift to other institutions with greater capacity for engaging local stakeholders in improving
natural resource management.
Finally, because of the miombo’s critical role in mitigating the impacts of poverty, the impacts of
deforestation and degradation need to be more fully incorporated into development planning
in a manner that accounts for the costs of providing the alternative safety nets. Conversely, by
improving the capacity for local woodland management through changes in the policy framework,
the role of safety nets for mitigating the impacts of rural poverty can be greatly enhanced. The
management of dry woodlands is unlikely ever to be a path out of poverty, but it can do a great deal
for reducing its negative impacts.
8 MANAGING THE MIOMBO WOODLANDS OF SOUTHERN AFRICA