In Central Africa, potential profits hang in trees, but often stay there because they can not reach the market. And so fail to bring in badly needed income for rural families. CIFOR and the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) recently joined forces to advise rural households how to better take advantage of these hanging profits.

In our globalized world, products can be produced in one country and sold at the other end of the world, often with huge profits. But in Central Africa, poor roads, the seasonality of products, limited knowledge of markets, inadequate networking and lack of education about storage and processing capacity means that income from the sale of tree products often fails to outweigh the costs.

The Farmer Enterprise Development (FED) project seeks to improve farmer household incomes through training in marketing and domestication.

FED is a joint initiative between CIFOR, ICRAF, the Central Africa Regional Program for the Environment (CARPE), the Institute of Agricultural Research for Development (IRAD), the Support Service to Grassroots Initiatives of Development (SAILD), the Association pour le Développement Intégral des Exploitants Agricoles du Centre (ADEAC) and the Twantoh Mixed Farming Common Initiative Group (MIFACIG).

It is supported by the Belgian Development Cooperation and applies a combination of: market research; workshops and training; research and development; and networking.

One of the products the project has focused on is njansang, a non-timber forest product (NTFP) produced primarily in Central Cameroon. In conjunction with ADEAC - a local farmer organization - CIFOR organized a series of workshops that brought together farmers and traders.

Abdon Awono, CIFOR Researcher, explains that during the workshops farmers and traders could exchange information for mutual benefit.

"An important element of the workshops was facilitating group sales," said Awono. "With group sales, farmers could see for themselves that there is a link between the quality of their product and the price they can ask for it. Since the smallholders usually work on a one to one basis with traders, they were not aware of this link."

"In addition, farmers often go to the markets without prior information about things like price and demand. So they run the risk of paying for transport and taxes without earning enough to cover these costs. Similarly, for the wholesalers, it happens that they may make a difficult and costly trip in search of tree products, without knowing in advance if there will be enough supply" said Awono.

As a result of these networking opportunities farmers were able to sell their njansang for prices 30% higher.

The question is, can this system be sustained on its own? Awono explains that a number of hurdles exist.

"Despite the huge income possibilities for rural households, the bureaucracy of obtaining the right documents for trading NTFP's is a serious obstacle for small traders" said Awono. "Government support for forest products should be strengthened. That is why CIFOR and partner organizations work together to inform policymakers about the benefits and challenges of the trade in tree products."

Story by Janneke Romijn & Abdon Awono, CIFOR