What’s in your forest?

Holistic Forest AssessmentsExamples and knowledge gaps

David Young, Rethinking Liberia’s Forests, Paynesville, 2015

UNFF Global Data• Where data are reliably available, the non‐

cash economic contributions of forests to household and national economies range between 3 and 5 times the formally recognized, cash contributions” which are estimated to be US$250 billion per year.

• >13 m people employed in formal forest sector; 1-1.5 billion people derive direct and indirect benefits / incomes.

• In tropical zones “forests are as important as or more important than agriculture” in the cash and non-cash contribution to rural livelihoods.

UNFF & Enterprise• SMFEs offer better prospects,

especially in collaboration with associations, because they are less capital‐intensive and address the broader dimensions of poverty: they help to secure local community resource rights; wealth is accrued locally; local entrepreneurship is empowered; social capital is created; and cultural diversity, and increased local environmental accountability are maintained.

Uganda• …growing concern that

environmental economic values are under- or not valued at all in budgetary and national planning processes.

• …the national contribution of forests to local peoples livelihoods level is US$190 m (2004).

• …the total economic value of all marketable and non-marketable values is ~US$340 m

Forest sector should receive support from treasury to deliver on the public goods aspect of its work.

Ghana• Ten key non-timber forest products

employ 420,000 people and generate US$90m a year.

• Informal cash economy contributes US$245m per year; there is no reliable data on the non-cash economy.

no visibility of the real contribution of forestry. If this economic activity was reflected in national accounting, it would make a significant addition to GDP.

LiberiaFor most people forests are sources of livelihoods. They provide: • Goods: protein, vegetables building

materials, medicinal products…Some consumed at home, some sold – to buy complimentary food, home provisions, services such as health care education.

• Services: cultural heritage, preservation of water bodies and forest cover to protect communities from storms

Liberia• Report for USAID (2013) “Based on the

data available, forest growth is projected at less than 1 m3/ha/yr…. Pre-conflict extraction rates averaged 7 m3/ha/yr, and were four times that during the conflict. Current extraction rates range from 10 to 30 m3/ha/yr.”

• Report for USAID (2015) “there are robust national and subnational markets for timber, charcoal, bushmeat, and other NTFPs. These domestic markets impact the forests and biodiversity and contribute to the economy in ways that are poorly understood”.

When forests go?• Food and medicines that could be

provided for free now has to be bought.

• Boreholes which now serve as the only water sources are insufficient nonfunctional or dry up in the dry season.

• Fish stocks have reduced and we have to go further to find them.

• Cultural heritage lost when cultural sites are destroyed.

Thank you

David Young

dyoung@globalwitness.org

Skype: dw_young