Indigenous Peoples’ Access to and Participation in Lobeke National Park

Independent Evaluation of the effectiveness of current access arrangements for Baka communities around Lobeke National Park, East Cameroon

Cameroon’s Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF) and the Association Sanguia Baka Buma’a Kpode (ASBABUK) are both parties to a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in 2019. The core objective of the MoU is to restore Baka access to and use of key biological and cultural resources within the confines of the three protected areas. The MoU also specifies that the parties will collaborate in three broad areas: developing and managing National Parks and their environs; safeguarding and promoting local communities’ rights; and capacity building.

This evaluation finds that 20 years after the creation of Lobeke National Park and three years after the MoU was signed, Baka communities still do not have access to their traditional territories in practice.

Baka access to Lobeke National Park Evaluation (English)

Accès et participation aux parcs nationaux de Lobéké, Boumba-Bek et Nki (Français)

Despite the good intentions of different actors, the MoU has been poorly implemented: community access arrangements have not been established; consultative bodies appear to have limited functionality or effectiveness; Baka communities have little knowledge of, understanding of, or faith in the MoU process, and ASBABUK – one of the two parties to the MoU – knows only a little more.

As the current MoU expires at the end of this month (26 February 2022), we urge MINFOF and WWF to take note of the key findings and recommendations of this evaluation in order to inform the imminent MoU renewal process.

The key findings of the evaluation are as follows:

• The central commitment under the MoU – the development of annual action plans to enable community access – has not been met.
• Communities have not experienced any actual improvements in access to the Park.
• Awareness and understanding of the MoU remains extremely low in communities, despite subsequent awareness-raising activities carried out by WWF and other actors, and levels of distrust of conservation actors (and the MoU process) remain high.
• Multiple respondents to the evaluation – including communities, CSOs and government – recognised that Baka access to resources is being significantly affected not only by the Parks, but also by other effective restrictions in place (and risks of violence) in the Park buffer zone, in areas under the control of forestry or safari companies. Lack of access to these areas has a knock-on effect for access to park areas since they act as a barrier which community members cannot pass to reach the Park. The effectiveness of any access arrangements to the Park hinges on a solution also being found for access in and through the buffer zone.
• Prolonged lack of access to the Parks has limited Baka practice of various traditional activities – this has had negative impacts on the transmission of cultural and ecological knowledge to younger generations,among other things. Despite this, Baka communities continue to express a strong commitment to the conservation of the forest and its ecosystem and have expressed the desire to explore ways to be more involved in park management.

The specific recommendations of the evaluation team are as follows:

1. Access arrangements for Baka communities should be set out explicitly in the MoU itself, and should continue in force until and unless another replacement agreement in reached – instead of requiring automatic renegotiation every year, or even expiring at the end of an MoU. This is important as it avoids the (considerable) risk that the failure to prepare and agree documents in a timely way delays, or causes a lapse, in access rights in between agreements. It also facilitates greater trust in and comprehension of these rights by Baka communities.
2. Access rights need to be clearly and legally established not only in relation to National Parks, but also in relation to buffer zone areas around National Parks (including those under the control of third parties). There are multiple ways this could be done, e.g. as multiple agreements or as one master agreement for an area, or even by legislative reform. In the short term, an MoU.
3. (Revised) access rules should be developed that facilitate easy and largely unfettered access for Baka communities to the Parks as well as in the Park buffer zonesr. The current informal rules developed for Lobeke have proved unworkable and unduly burdensome for communities, and should be revised in consultation with communities. As a matter of principle, there should be a presumption that any activity carried out by the Baka within a protected area is permitted, unless explicitly prohibited in the text.   
4. Separate MoUs should be developed for each of the three Parks (Boumba Bek, Nki and Lobeke) in the area, adapted to each context and negotiated with communities in the vicinity of each Park (which may mean that not all MoUs are the same). This is important to ensure that the MoU addresses key issues for each area, can engage better with other local stakeholders and (most critically) is at a scale which permits better engagement with those Baka communities that are directly affected. 
5. MoUs should be agreed with, and signed by, all Baka communities that are affected by them. Whilst this is more onerous than appointing a representative organisation, it is essential both for the process of rebuilding trust between conservation actors and communities, and to ensure that communities are aware of the process and therefore can take advantage of access rights.
6. MINFOF, international partners and local CSOs should significantly expand their engagement with and support for the organisation and development of Baka communities around each of the three Parks covered by the MoU, with the objective of increasing community capacity to participate in Park processes generally, as well as to facilitate the emergence of legitimate community-based representative organisations. Given the vast geographical area covered by the MoU, and the logistical difficulties of travelling in the zone, it is important that Baka communities have access to support and organisational representation at a more local level. Support for building this organisational capacity – ideally involving local CSOs – needs to be properly resourced, regular, and provided over multiple years.
7. Ecoguards and other Park staff should be involved in community engagement, consultation and sensitisation work (alongside CSO actors), particularly in relation to issues of access. This is an important step for rebuilding trust as well as ensuring rules are well understood by both communities and ecoguards.
8. Substantially more resources need to be allocated to both negotiation of MoUs and ongoing engagement processes. Resources should be allocated in particular to Park management, CSOs / community organisations and, importantly, communities themselves. Other conservation and development actors should ensure their interventions to support Parks allocate adequate resources for improved integration of rights. 
9. An effective and binding complaints and redress mechanism should be integrated into the MoU to improve accountability.
10. MINFOF and international conservation partners should actively support the emergence of indigenous controlled conservation areas in Cameroon, through direct funding, capacity building and legal reform.

See here for accompanying evaluation of the Lobeke Complaints Mechanism