Display Website Format
Home > Regions > Central Africa > News > A tree business without felling
A tree business without felling
Esther Foungong is a young (28) trader and entrepreneur on Makenene market, Center Province, Cameroon. She sells safou (Dacryodes edulis), a highly traded forest product in the Central African country. Esther was only 14 years old when she started selling safou. “To make a living, as I had nobody to take care of my school fees”, she explains. By now, with the money she earns from her trade, she’s able to send her own children to school, take care of her parents and siblings, and support her cousin to go to university. In 1999, when CIFOR researchers met her for the first time, she was doing retail. Since then, she received training and market information from CIFOR which enabled her to improve her activities and income form the sale of safou.“I’m now in wholesale by selling large quantities to traders from Gabon. I have invested in a storage facility where I store the safou that I buy from farmers before selling them to the Gabonese.” Safou is highly consumed in Gabon but hardly produced there. Traders come especially to Makenene market since the place is widely known for its good quality of the product. Esther decided to expand her investment and now owns a bar in the market, which is also her contact point during the non-productive season. While the season for selling safou is short – from April to September- her monthly income in 2004 was between US$ 1600-2400. Esther's dream is to make a connection with European markets to sell ‘Makenene Dacryodes label’. "Despite my young age, I am taking care of my family” concludes Esther. “I think I do better than many civil servants. My children do not envy others, so I am proud of what I am doing but I still believe I can do better if I work harder and continue to get support from institutions like CIFOR." The story of Esther shows how trees can help people out of poverty. Not by felling them, but by using the products that trees produce, like nuts, barks, fruit and fibres.
CIFOR has been studying the role of these Non Timber Forest Products (NTFPs) for more than 10 years. “NTFP’s have great potential to reduce poverty”, says CIFOR researchers Ousseynou Ndoye. “Not only do they contribute to people’s daily health and nutritional needs, many of them also have commercial value and can be sold in national and international markets.”This year, CIFOR started a new project together with FAO to help local communities develop small forest based businesses, while giving them incentives to better manage and protect their resource base, allowing them to tap the riches of the forests without depleting them.
The project, funded by the European Commission, will be carried out in Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Both countries have abundant stretches of rainforest and a majority of people depend on NTFPs.Together with FAO and partner research institutions, CIFOR will use participatory methods to find out which forest products people use for household and commercial purposes, which tools are needed to turn these products into enterprises and help local communities develop management and business plans.Helping forest communities manage their forest resources is only part of the solution, says Ousseynou. “We also need an active policy dialogue at all levels to guarantee communities’ access to resources and markets.” This is why CIFOR and its partners bring in national and local officials in the process early on, to make them aware of the importance of their support to communities.