Forêts communautaires camerounaises et Plan d'action Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT): Quel prix pour la légalité ?

Cameroonian community forests and forest law enforcement, governance and trade action plan (FLEGT): Legality at what price? illegal logging is a threat to the world's tropical forests. To act against overexploitation of timber, the European Union has set up the Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade action plan (FLEGT), which opened the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) negotiating agenda with Cameroon. In 2010, the two parties signed the VPA, committing Cameroon to ensure the legality of timber from all logging concessions sold on external and domestic markets. Community forests (CF) were included in the agreement and must therefore ensure the legality of their timber production. To do that, a specific legality grid has been developed. This was tested in half of active community forests in Cameroon to analyse any gaps between activities as practiced in the field and the legality criteria set out in the legality grid. The result show that no CF fully complied with this grid. The study identified obstacles due to complex procedures and to the excessive costs of compliance. Some criteria not currently met could be complied with through community capacity-building and by amending certain regulations. Under these conditions, community forests could become a source of legal supplies at least for the domestic timber market.