Forest-land relationships

3.5.1 Land tenure systems

Two parallel land tenure systems exist for the Korup National Park forest which is formally a state property. A 1983 forestry law of the Republic of Cameroon prohibits; the use of timber and NTFPs, cash crop farming and hunting inside the national park, without permission. It also prohibits the act of indigenes permitting strangers to use forest products (exercise of alienation rights). Pending relocation, communities still have limited usufruct rights granted by state law. However, communities claim customary land use rights and ownership over the entire forest and village elders reveal that local customary use rights are maintained on the basis of land clearance. Boundaries with adjacent communities are demarcated by the use of streams, trees, crops (like pineapples) and other physical attributes (hills). These traditional territories are recognized by communities whose members normally live, farm, gather and hunt within their own territory. Village land rights extend up to the point where that village clears and ends. The territory is ordered according to certain criteria. For instance, the village forest is distributed among lineages, which further distribute the land to households. The private patches of land lie within 10 km

around the village (See Map 5). Owners carry out livelihood activities and jealously keep away unauthorized entrants from the plots including those from the same village.

Therefore, individuals have private ownership and use rights on the overall communal land.

Map 5: Traditionally defined land entitlements; Esukutan

(Source: Adapted from Management Plan, 2002)

Expert interviews with elders reveal that an individual cannot lease, rent or sell land because it is communally owned. The entire forest is apportioned to the different lineages that make up the clan. Within each lineage, landed property is bequeathed by parcelling it among male children. Discussions in Esukutan reveal that land ownership is largely dependent on marital status. Customarily, women are not allowed to own land, but could work on their husbands’ lands. On the other hand, males of any age are allocated farm plots once they have a wife and are living on their own. Landed property bequeath is synonymous to capital bequeath because as one Esukutan elder noted, “land is the biggest

capital to give a son”. Inheritance is in itself an insurance policy; it does not only guarantee the continuous survival of the farm but also ensures that future heirs would earn a livelihood. Also, the sons or brothers of the family head as well as from his mother’s family can inherit land. Land ownership influences the decision of a family to accept the marriage proposal of a man to their daughter. In principle, women could open cocoa farms in the village forestland. Informants could not remember the last time any woman ever asked for a farm plot in Esukutan. Household interviews revealed that women who reported incomes from cash crops were widows who worked on their late husbands’ lands. In all, land entitlements discriminate against women, which stand in between explanations why women do not own cash crops farms in either of the communities. Elders parcel land to their sons early enough because it serves as a contract under their social security system whereby children take care of their parents when the latter grow old and frail. Women may not own land but they are under obligation to care for their parents too. Every holder of land has a lifelong right; as a custodian of the land for future generations as the customs demand them not to be proprietors. So, land rights are generally controlled by the customs and the chief in consultation with the village council regulates land use by any stranger.

‘Stranger’ household in Esukutan provided 6 bottles of afofo, one goat and food to the authorities who finally granted them a piece of land to cultivate. They do not have the right to sell or lease that land but could carry out all forest linked livelihood activities.

Hunting with firearms in daylight or at night does not respect boundaries but a part of the virgin forest is for hunting. For Esukutan, the area of forest beyond a 10 km limit from the settlement is where large scale hunting and collection of NTFPs takes place (this area is coloured green on Map 5). It is access-free only to village members. This open access does not guarantee exhaustibility because Ekpwe laws are binding for extraction in the entire village forest. However, people from other communities are free to hunt in such an open access territory but not without formal permission from the village council to conduct more than a casual hunting or gathering expedition. Village leaders and community members do acknowledge that such acts took place up to the 80s but they no longer do it.

3.5.2 Land clearance: an authenticator of ownership rights

Land clearance is an important customary activity because it authenticates ownership rights. A piece of farmland is appropriated by clearance. Men go for a land survey by wandering around the thick forest cutting trails that would become tracts. They look for a place that has not got too many rocks, tight tree cover, and is not hilly. The reason is that rocks are not good for the roots of the crops; and that roots of trees as well as their shades did not provide good conditions for plant growth. Farming on the hillside needs much investment in time and energies to employ soil conservation techniques (Chapter 5). There are labour intensive since practices are manual and not mechanised. Farms are located some 500 meters away from big streams and rivers because they usually overflow their banks during periods of heavy rainfall. So, to avoid crops damage by floods villagers farm far away from streams and rivers. Also, informants disclose that encroachments are a potential source of conflict and so people generally farm close to the boundaries with neighbours. This guarantees automatic encroachments checks and reduces conflicts.

Table 5: Farm sizes as disclosed by households in both communities

Category Number of households in each category

Ikondo Kondo I Esukutan

Small (0.5-1.5 acres) 17 16

Medium (2-3.5 acres) 18 18

Large (4.0- above acres) 6 6

Generally farm sizes are small. For instance, the highest cocoa producer in Esukutan does not own more than three hectares of forest while the smallest cocoa producer in Ikondo Kondo I cleared only about one hectare of forest. The declared farmland holdings in 2006 are grouped in three categories of small, medium and large farmland cultivators as in Table 5. In 2006, Ikondo Kondo I households cleared a total of 96 hectares of forest, 15 hectares less than the official declaration after the relocation in 2000 (Korup Project, 1999:24).

Esukutan households cleared a total of 85 hectares of farmland with an average of 1.98 hectares per household. In 1923, the average was between one acre (4046, 24 m²; slightly less than a hectare), and one acre and a half (6069, 36 m²; slightly above one hectare) per family (Carr, 1923:25). Our findings show that small farmland cultivator households in the communities are mainly young couples or unmarried women.

Quantitative data show that farm size is correlated to the gender of the household heads.

Hence, in both communities, females head half of the smallholder households. Also, female-headed households cleared a maximum of 2 hectares. A cash incentive of 23000 FRS CFA was paid to relocated household that cleared up to 1 hectare motivated locals to clear bigger portions of land. In 2006, many households did no longer cultivate the entire volume of land that was cleared in 2000. It was also observed that female headed households in Ikondo Kondo I, clear land that is big enough for farming food crops.