The Rainforests of Cameroon :
Experience and Evidence from a Decade of Reform

In 1994, the Government of Cameroon
introduced an array of forest policy reforms, both
regulatory and market-based, to support a more organized,
transparent, and sustainable system for accessing and using
forest resources. This report describes how these reforms
played out in the rainforests of Cameroon. The intention is
to provide a brief account of a complex process and identify
what worked, what did not, and what can be improved. The
barriers to placing Cameroon's forests at the service
of its people, its economy, and the environment originated
with the extractive policies of successive colonial
administrations. The barriers were further consolidated
after independence through a system of political patronage
and influence in which forest resources became a coveted
currency for political support. These deeply entangled
commercial and political interests have only recently, and
reluctantly, started to diverge. In 1994, the government
introduced an array of forest policy reforms, both
regulatory and market based. The reforms changed the rules
determining who could gain access to forest resources, how
access could be obtained, how those resources could be used,
and who will benefit from their use. This report assesses
the outcomes of reforms in forest-rich areas of Cameroon,
where the influence of industrial and political elites has
dominated since colonial times.