Approximately 46% of Cameroon’s land area is dense rainforest. The Congo Basin is the largest rainforest in Africa and second largest carbon sink, making it crucial in mitigating climate change. Protecting and conserving this and other forests in Cameroon is fundamental in addressing global and national climate change.
However, forest resources are a major economic contributor in Cameroon through the trade of timber and non-timber forest products (NTFPs) and support local subsistence. Due to poor resource management, this natural resource is shrinking through deforestation, agricultural land expansion, mining, and bush fires. This threatens trade, food security, rural livelihoods and the fight to mitigate climate change.
The Cameroon Vision 2035 is a national development plan designed to respond to the country’s economic emergence. The Ministry of Environment, Protection of Nature and Sustainable Development (MINEPDED) is responsible for ensuring economic growth is managed in a sustainable way, including the management of natural resources and their vulnerability to climate change.
Commonwealth Alumnus Emmanuel Suka is the Division Chief, Environmental Inspections and Evaluation at MINEPDED. He leads on policy development and provides the valuation and assessment of forest management in Cameroon to implement strategies to restore degraded landscapes and build capacity for forest conservation practices.
Career path and development
In 2007 Emmanuel joined MINEPDED as the Environmental Inspector. During this time, he pursued a Master’s in Tropical Forestry at Bangor University through a Commonwealth Scholarship.
Hailing from Ambazonia, the English-speaking State of Cameroon, Emmanuel faced many hardships while studying due to the Anglophone armed conflict and internet shot-down Anglophone Crises.
Despite navigating studies during a conflict and alongside a full-time job, Emmanuel developed key skills, such as time management and self-discipline, that helped in completing the course and applying his learnings at MINEPDED.
“The Scholarship gave me an opportunity to learn how to be more in control of my behaviour, actions, skills, and decisions. I equally gained values that helped me to make better decisions, motivations that kept me going even at the time when confronted with uphill challenges, confidence that gave me the ability to learn from failures, and gained more agency in my life.”
Emmanuel found modules on forest management, agroforestry systems and practices, policy and governance, and research methodology useful in further advancing his professional career at MINEPDED.
Following the course, Emmanuel was promoted to a leadership position as a Division Chief. In this role, he carries out environmental inspections and evaluates forest management units and protected zones, waterbodies, and watersheds to support MINEPDED’s commitment to protecting natural resources.
To further gain professional skills and advance his learnings, Emmanuel volunteered at the Limbe Botanic Garden (LBG) at the foot of Mount Cameroon. LBG is an internationally recognised centre for research, education, and information on sustainable use and management of biodiversity in the region.
At LBG, he applied the skills he gained during his studies in Integrated Forest Management to support biodiversity conservation efforts to improve livelihoods and contribute to forest research units in Bimbia-Bonadikombo and Mokoko forest reserves. This voluntary experience further strengthened Emmanuel’s skills and capacity to advance projects on sustainable forest management.
Participatory community projects
During his Master’s Emmanuel was introduced to the Integrated Landscape Approach (ILA) This is a participatory approach and provides a framework for balancing competing needs and integrating policies to support multiple land uses.
With multiple uses of land comes multiple stakeholders. As a keen practitioner in the participatory approach and to ensure the projects meet the needs of all stakeholders, Emmanuel includes community members in sustainable community projects. This enables the community to work together to identify problems, design plans to improve agricultural production, restore gaps in multifunction use of forest landscapes, and mitigate climate risks.
Emmanuel has applied this approach to several projects, including watershed management, landslide prevention, agroforestry cultivation of indigenous plant species, and reforestation in degraded areas.
“Through my work, I have filled the gap of an integrated forest management expert that my country lacked.”
One such project is the Participatory Community Natural Resource Management Project in Mabonji, Southwest Cameroon. The project sought to restore over 300 hectares of degraded hill land and a local community water supply.
Mobilising resources from local stakeholders, and with Emmanuel’s guidance and support on how to protect and manage water catchments and ground water sources, the project succeeded in improving the degraded tropical land through community level interventions. Due to its success, Emmanuel’s approach and interventions is now being used as a case study in novel agroforestry interventions to restore degraded regions of tropical lands and has been published as a book volume by Noval Science Publishers, New York, USA.
“The project was a novel agroforestry system, adapted to rainforest regions, based on local knowledge using participatory methods, involving all local stakeholders, for the design and implementation of land uses for degraded and damaged tropical lands.”
With ILA, Emmanuel has strengthened the local governance of forest dependent communities, boosting their sense of ownership, improving the multifunctional use of forest and agriculture land, and increased local income and social welfare.
Inclusive practices in forest management
Drawing on his Master’s studies, Emmanuel highlights the need for socially inclusive policies on environment and forest conservation in forest-dependent communities in Southwest Cameroon.
As a humanitarian and environment policy development researcher, Emmanuel designs projects to involve all community members and stakeholders regardless of their gender and sex. Based on his own personal experiences of being raised by a single mother dependent on agricultural land, Emmanuel states that marginalised groups such as women and LGBTQ+, are excluded from equal land rights and access to valuable economic resources. He stresses the importance of integrating marginalised groups in community forest restoration efforts.
In March 2022, Emmanuel worked with the Mabonji community to design and implement a community-led project to address their environmental needs. To ensure the representation of all community member needs, he supported the inclusion of LGBTQ+ and women in the project development and implementation.
As a result of this inclusive approach, these marginalised groups gained a sense of belonging, empowerment, and confidence to utilise their skills and abilities to actively participate in joint community efforts.
“Integration of segregated and disadvantaged people in decision making processes enabled equitable access to restored degraded and abandoned land resources. The project is moral boosting so this encouraged LGBTQ+ to actively participate in social and economic life without fear of stigmatisation. Local incomes and welfare standards among LGBTQ+ and women have increased.”
Restoration of degraded forest land
To further encourage the adoption of a multistakeholder approach in conservation efforts, Emmanuel has introduced Environmental Education (EE) packages for government ministries, NGOs and, environment based civil society organisations. The EE packages include awareness information on low carbon energy efficiencies and circular economy, protection of indigenous plants and trees, use of agroforestry techniques, and how to carry out participatory community projects, including gathering local data and knowledge, to protect forests lands and ecosystems. As part of the package, Emmanuel also provides training and workshops.
Over 1,500 farmers in Mabonji, Meme division, have utilised the EE package in adopting more sustainable and environmentally and agroforestry friendly agricultural practices. This has contributed to Cameroon’s efforts in reducing overexploitation of forest resources whilst achieving economic benefits sustainably.
“Through the EE packages, we provide guidelines on cultivating medicinal plants such as Prunus Africana, a plant with medicinal benefits, found in the highlands of Mt Cameroon. These plants are being overexploited. Communities are trained to cultivate them ethically from forests and plant them on their farms and nurseries. These plants become their personal property, and they learn to protect them, taking ownership and control.”
Contributing to the national economic development agenda
Recognising the impact of his Commonwealth Scholarship on his career, Emmanuel states that the skills gained in policy and data analysis during his studies have helped him strengthen MINEPDED’s policies to conduct valuation of forests land resources to protect Cameroon’s tropical forests. This was fundamental in contributing to the President’s economic and development plan as part of the Cameroon Vision 2035.
He credits his Master’s course with fostering a practice of knowledge sharing to support best practice in forest management. This has been vital in his role at MINEPDED, working with colleagues and local communities across Southwest Cameroon to adopt agroforestry methods for sustainable forest restoration and protection.
“I have become a more confident forest policy researcher and communicator, expert designer, and manager of sustainable environmental governance projects in forest-dependent communities in Cameroon, after the Scholarship.”
Emmanuel Suka is a 2017 Commonwealth Scholar from Ambazonia in Cameroon. He completed an MSc in Tropical Forestry at Bangor University.
