Mercy Hlordz (l), Akos Matsiador (centre) and Mary Azametsi (r) are all victims of climate change. Credit: Jamila Akweley Okertchiri/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Sep 29 2014 (IPS)

As climate change interest groups raise their voices across Africa to call for action at the COP20 climate meeting in December and the crucial COP21 in Paris in 2015, many worry that the continent may never have fair representation at the talks.

The African Group noted during a May meeting in Ethiopia that while negotiations remain difficult, they still hope to break some barriers through close collaboration and partnerships with different African groups involved in negotiations."Most of our problems are financial. For example, in negotiations Cameroon is seated next to Canada, which comes with a delegation of close to a hundred people, while two of us represent Cameroon." -- lead negotiator Tomothé Kagombet

Within the Central African Forest Commission (COMIFAC) group, a preparatory meeting is planned for next month with experts and delegates from the 10 member countries, according to Martin Tadoum, deputy secretary general of COMIFAC, “but the group can only end up sending one or two representatives to COP meetings.”

Meanwhile, the Pan-African Parliamentarians’ Network on Climate Change (PAPNCC) is hoping to educate lawmakers and African citizens on the problem to better take decisions about how to manage it.

“The African parliamentarians have a great role to influence government decisions on climate change and defend the calls of various groups on the continent,” Honorable Awudu Mbaya, Cameroonian Parliamentarian and president of PAPNCC, told IPS.

PAPNCC operates in 38 African countries, with its headquarters in Cameroon. Besides working with governments and decision-makers, it is also networking with youth groups and civil society groups in Africa to advance climate goals.

Innovative partnership models involving government, civil society groups, think tanks and academia could also enforce governments’ positions and build the capacity of negotiators.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) has noted that bargaining by all parties is increasingly taking place outside the formal negotiating space, and Africa must thus be prepared to engage on these various platforms in order to remain in the loop.

Civil society organisations (CSOs) in Africa are designing various campaign strategies for COP 20 and COP 21. The Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), a diverse coalition of more than 500 CSOs and networks, is using national platforms and focal persons to plan a PACJA week of activities in November.

“PACJA Week of Action is an Africa-wide annual initiative aimed at stimulating actions and reinforcing efforts to exercise the power of collective action ahead of COPs. The weeks will involve several activities like staging pickets, rallies, marches, and other forms of action in schools, communities, workplaces, and public spaces,” Robert Muthami Kithuku, a programme support officer at PACJA headquarters in Kenya, told IPS.

Others, like the African Youth Initiative on Climate Change (AYICC) and the African Youth Alliance, are coming up with similar strategies to provide a platform for coordinated youth engagement and participation in climate discussions and the post-2015 development agenda at the national, regional and international levels.

“We plan to send letters to negotiators, circulating statements, using the social media, using both electronic and print media and also holding public forums. Slogans to enhance the campaign are also being adopted,” Kithuku said.

Africa’s vulnerability to climate change seems to have ushered in a new wave of south-south collaboration in the continent. The PAPNCC Cameroon chapter has teamed up with PACJA to advocate for greater commitments on climate change through tree-planting events in four Cameroonian communities. It is also holding discussions with regional parliamentarians on how climate change can better be incorporated in local legislation.

In June, mayors of the Central African sub-region gathered in Cameroon to plan their first participation in major climate negotiations at COP21 in Paris. Under the banner The International Association of Francophone Mayors of Central Africa on Towns and Climate Change (AIMF), the mayors are seeking ways to adapt their cities to the effects of climate change and to win development opportunities through mitigating carbon dioxide emissions.

During a workshop of African Group of Negotiators in May 2014, it was recognised that climate change negotiations offer opportunities for Africa to strengthen its adaptive capacity and to move towards low-carbon economic development. Despite a lack of financial resources, Africa has a comparative advantage in terms of natural resources like forests, hydro and solar power potential.

At the May meeting, Ethiopia’s minister of Environment and Forests, Belete Tafere, urged the lead negotiators in attendance to be ambitious and focused in order to press the top emitters to make binding commitments to reduce emissions. He also advised the negotiators to prioritise mitigation as a strategy to demonstrate the continent’s contribution to a global solution.

But negotiations are still difficult. Africa has fewer resources to send delegates to COPs, coupled with a relatively low level of expertise to understand technical issues in the negotiations.

“Africa is just a representative in negotiations and has very little capacity to influence decisions,” Tomothé Kagombet, one of Cameroon’s lead negotiators, told IPS.

“Most of our problems are financial. For example, in negotiations Cameroon is seated next to Canada, which comes with a delegation of close to a hundred people, while two of us represent Cameroon, and this is the case with all other African countries.”

He said that while developed countries swap delegates and experts in and out of the talks, the Africans are also obliged remain at the negotiating table for long periods without taking a break.

“At the country levels, there are no preparatory meetings that can help in capacity building and in enforcing countries’ positions,” he said.

As a strategy to improve the capacity of delegates, COMIFAC recruits consultants during negotiations to brief representatives from the 10 member countries on various technical issues in various forums.

“To reduce the problem of numbers, the new strategy is that each country is designated to represent the group in one aspect under negotiation. For example, Chad could follow discussions on adaptation, Cameroon on mitigation, DRC on finance,” COMIFAC’s Tadoum told IPS.

With a complex international climate framework that has evolved over many years, with new mitigation concepts and intricacies in REDD (reducing emissions from deforestation), the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), and more than 60 different international funds, the challenges for African experts to grasp these technicalities are enormous, Samuel Nguiffo of the Center for Environment and Development told IPS (CED). CED is a subregional NGO based in Cameroon.

“There is no country budget set aside for climate change that can help in capacity building and send more delegates to COPs. The UNFCCC sponsors one or two representatives from developing countries but the whole of Africa might not measure up with the delegates from one developed nation,” said Cameroon’s negotiator, Tomothé Kagombet.

The lead African negotiators are now crafting partnerships with with young African lawyers in the negotiations process and compiling a historical narrative of Africa’s participation and decisions relevant to the continent as made by the Conference of Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC process, from Kyoto in 1997 to Paris in 2015.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Lara Adama digs for water in a dried up river bed in Dumai, in Cameroon’s far north. There has been a nine-month drought in the region and recurrent cholera outbreaks. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
DUMAI/YAOUDE, Cameroon, Aug 19 2014 (IPS)

Under a scorching sun, with temperatures soaring to over 40 degrees Celsius, Lara Adama’s family is forced to dig for water from a dried-out river bed in Dumai, in northern Cameroon. 

This is one of the rivers that used to flow into the shrinking Lake Chad but there is not much water here.

There has been a nine-month-long drought in the region and Adama tells IPS that her family “digs out the sand on this river bed to tap water.”

“We depend on this water for everything in the house,” Adama, a villager in Mokolo in Cameroon’s Far North Region, says.

A cholera outbreak has been declared in Adama’s village. But she and other community members have no choice but to get their water from this river.

The lone borehole in this village of about 1,500 people is out of use due to technical problems.

“Every family comes here to retrieve drinking water. Our animals too depend on this water source to survive. When we come after the animals have already polluted a hole, we simply dig another to avoid any health problems,” she says.

This region is threatened by extreme water shortages and climate variability. Barren soils constitute some 25 to 30 percent of the surface area of this region. Lake Chad is rapidly shrinking while Lake Fianga dried up completely in December 1984.

Gregor Binkert, World Bank country director for Cameroon, tells IPS that a water-related crisis is prevalent in the north and there is an increased need for protection from floods and drought, which are affecting people more regularly.

“Northern Cameroon is characterised by high poverty levels, and it is also highly vulnerable to natural disasters and climate shocks, including frequent droughts and floods,” Binkert explains.

The protracted droughts in Far North Region have triggered a sharp increase in cholera cases. The outbreak is mainly concentrated in the Mayo-Tsanaga region as all its six health districts have cases of the infectious disease. The current outbreak has already resulted in more than 200 deaths out of the 1,500 cholera cases reported here since June.

According Cameroon’s Minister of Public Health Andre Mama Fouda, “poor sanitation and limited access to good drinking water are the main causes of recurrent outbreak in the Far North. A majority of those infected with the disease are children under the age of five and women.”

Poor hygiene practices

“Cholera in this region is not only a water scarcity problem, it also aggravated by the poor hygienic practices that are deeply rooted in people’s culture. Water is scarce and considered as a very precious commodity, but handling it is quite unhygienic,” Félicité Tchibindat, the country representative for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Cameroon, tells IPS.

Cultural practices are still primitive in most villages and urban areas.

Northerners have a culture where people publicly share water jars, from which everyone drinks from.

“These practices and many others make them vulnerable to water vector diseases. [It is the] reason why cholera can easily spread to other communities. Cholera outbreaks are a result of inadequate water supplies, sanitation, food safety and hygiene practices,” Tchibindat says.

Open defecation is also common in the region. According Global Atlas of Helminth Infections, 50 to 75 percent of the rural population in Far North Cameroon defecate in the open, compared to 25 to 50 percent of people in urban areas.

Access to good drinking water and sanitation is also very limited. Two out of three people do not have access to proper sanitation and hygiene. While about 40 percent of the population has access to good drinking water, this figure is much lower in rural areas. In rural Cameroon only about 18 percent of people have access to improved drinking water sources, which are on average about over 30 minutes away.

Development challenges

Water sanitation and health (WASH) is vital for development, yet Far North Region has some of the most limited infrastructure in the entire nation, coupled with security challenges as the region is increasily throated by Nigeria’s extremist group Boko Haram.

Poverty is high in the region, UNICEF’s Tchibindat says. And the security issue in neighbouring countries has not helped Cameroon provide proper access to medical services here.

According to UNICEF, major challenges abound in Cameroon. There is a low capacity of coordination for WASH at all levels, and poor institutional leadership of sanitation issues. The decentralisation of the WASH sector means there is no proper support with inequitable distribution of human resources in regions.

“The government and many development partners have provided boreholes to communities and the region counts more than 1,000 boreholes today,” Parfait Ndeme from the Ministry of Mines, Water Resources and Energy says.

But about 30 percent of boreholes are non-functional and need repair, according to UNICEF.

Ndeme explains that, “the cost of providing potable water in the sahelian region might be three times more costly than down south. Distance is one major factor that influences cost and the arid climate in the region makes it difficult to have underground water all year round.”

A borehole in the northern region costs at least eight million Francs (about 16,300 dollars) compared to two million Francs (about 4,000 dollars) in other regions.

Health care challenges are prominent.

“The Far North has limited access development which also has a direct influence of the quality of health care,” Tchibindat says.

The unavailability of basic infrastructure and equipment in health centres makes it difficult to practice in isolated rural areas. Consequently, most rural health centre have a high rate of desertion by staff due to the low level of rural development, she adds.

Most of Cameroon’s health workers, about 59.75 percent, are concentrated in the richest regions; Centre, Littoral and West Region, serving about 42.14 percent of Cameroon’s 21 million people.

According to the World Health Organisation:

• 30.9 percent of health centres in Cameroon do not have a medical analysis laboratory.
• 83 percent of health centres do not have room for minor surgery.
• 45.7 percent of health centres have no access to electricity
• 70 percent of health centres have no tap water.

“Due to lack of equipment in hospitals, the treatment might only start after a couple of hours increasing the probability of it spreading,” Peter Tambe, a health expert based in Maroua, the capital of Far North Region, tells IPS.

“Report of new cholera cases are numerous in isolated villages and the present efforts by the government and development partners are not sufficient to treat and also monitor prevalence,” Tambe says.

Since the discovery of cholera in the region, the government and UNICEF and other partners have doubled their services to these localities to enforce health facilities and provide the population with basic hygiene aid, water treatment tablets and free treatment for patients, regardless of their nationality, along the border with Chad and Nigeria.

“Despite insecurity challenges facing this region, the government and its partners have embarked on information exchanges with Niger, Chad, and Nigeria to avoid further cross-border cases,” Public Health Minister Fouda tells IPS.

Edited by: Nalisha Adams

The writer can be contacted at nformonde@gmail.com

Judith Muma, a smallholder farmer from Cameroon’s Northwest Region, says if climate change adaptation funds could reach farmers like her, her farming costs would reduce. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Aug 14 2014 (IPS)

In Cameroon’s Northwest Region, Judith Muma walks 9km from her home to her 300-square-metre farm. The vegetables she grows here are flourishing thanks to the money she has borrowed from her njangi (thrift group) and a local credit union to finance a small artisanal irrigation scheme.

“I spend more money today buying farm implements such as water tanks, watering pumps, fertilisers, insecticides and improved seeds. I think we must spend in farming today if we want to adapt to climate change,” Muma tells IPS.

Cameroon’s economy is primarily agrarian and about 70 percent of this Central African nation’s 21.7 million people are involved in farming. Changes in temperature and precipitation pose a serious threat to the nation’s economy where agriculture contributes about 45 percent to the annual GDP.

In the northern parts of Cameroon, the semi-arid lowlands and hills are mostly dependent on rainfall and groundwater. The impact of forest clearance on hydrological processes has also aggravated climate change impact in these areas.“If most of the projects on climate change adaptation ... could reach us, the farmers, directly, important farm implements the cost of farming could reduce.” Judith Muma, smallholder farmer, Cameroon

Muma explains that even small-scale subsistence farmers like her now need to invest money in their livelihoods to ensure a minimal output. She says as a result of her investment, most of her harvest — 60 percent — is sold at a local vegetable market.

According to the World Bank, agriculture in Africa declined in absolute terms from eight billion dollars in 1984 to 3.5 billion dollars in 2005. There was also a decline in development cooperation policies and in national budget allocations for agriculture.

“This drop in concern for agriculture had a considerable influence on Africa’s capacity to develop climate adaptation policies and early warnings [systems]. But after two decades of decline, investments in agriculture are now on the rise,” Collotte Eboko, an agriculture inspector in Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, tells IPS.

“Sub-regional initiatives have generated a multiplicity of commitments to addressing climate change, poverty and hunger with a new focus on climate friendly agriculture,” Eboko says.

According to a United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, Africa faces “very high” risks to crop production as a result of global warming.

Last year’s Adaptation Gap study published by the U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP) warned that Africa could face an annual adaptation bill of 35 to 50 billion dollars by 2050.

But Africa lags behind as far as adaptation projects to support vulnerable groups are concerned.

“African governments have not done enough for the developed world to see adaption as priority for the continent. They still think climate change is a white people’s [western] problem…

“The position of Africa is grounded on these assumptions. But if we started by showing more commitments, our claims shall be more rational,” Samuel Nguiffo, of the Centre for Environmental Development, a research organisation in Cameroon, tells IPS.

Investment in climate change adaptation can help ensure that the impacts of climate change — including a projected 20 to 50 percent decline in water availability — do not reverse decades of development progress in Africa, according to the UNEP.

As the international community prepares for the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Paris 2015, Africa still has much at stake in this global discuss. But the issues are many and complex due to the continent’s high level of vulnerability to climate change and its low level of resources.

But Nguiffo says that Africa should not wait for a developed nation to finance a policy formulation project.

“The will and commitments should rather come from our own parliaments and decision makers first. Africa needs an effective climate change adaptation policy that considers climate change as survival issue.

“Integrating a gender approach is vital to promoting a quick response to climate action both at international and national level,” Nguiffo says.

Many African countries are lagging behind as far as adaptation projects are concerned. The Climate Funds Update (CFU) website highlights a large gap between funding approved and funding spent on projects in Africa.

For this reason, Africans have missed out on important funding opportunity for their projects. For example, under the U.N.’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), only two percent of the over 7,000 projects are based on the continent.

•  In 2011, 72 CDM  projects  were  registered across Africa, accounting  for  only  two percent of global CDM projects.
• South Africa and Egypt host a majority of the projects in Africa, with the rest in the remaining African countries.
•  The remainder of the CDM projects are in the Asia–Pacific: 73.1 percent; and in Latin America and the Caribbean: 23.5 percent.

The failure of the CDM of the Kyoto Protocol to support projects in Africa has been a major concern for African climate experts.

This lag has been blamed on Africa’s low capacity to develop and invest in mitigation as well as climate-resilient agriculture.

“Africa is in dire need of capacity building of national institutions responsible for mitigation and adaptation to facilitate and increase Africa participation in CDMs and REDD,” Timothee Kagonbe, one of Cameroon’s envoys to the climate change negotiations, tells IPS.

There are serious bottlenecks in programme implementation in Africa. In Cameroon, for example, there were over 30 CDM projects registered by Cameroon’s Ministry of Environment, but only one has been implemented and is qualified as a CDM project.

In 2010, the Japanese government supported 20 African countries with 92.1 million dollars over three years to implement integrated and comprehensive adaptation actions and resilience plans.

According to Daniel Seba of the Ministry of Environment, “the Japanese Africa Adaptation Programme helped Cameroon develop climate-resilient policies and development processes to incorporate climate change risks/opportunities in priority sectors but we need funding for its implementation.”

But Kagonbe explains that weak governance and limited capacity has resulted in failures in climate change adaptation and mitigation projects. The various international procedures for the formulation and implementation of mitigation and adaptation projects are very complicated for African countries, which have very little capacity and funding.

The African Development Bank has recently opened the Africa Climate Change Fund. This is aimed at ensuring countries on the continent get more help adapting to the effects of global warming. The fund received six million dollars from Germany in April.

“Climate change is a great opportunity for economic growth given increasing climate funding pledges and if more investment is made in agriculture it will becomes more sustainable, increasing its productivity and becomes more resilient against the impact of climate change,”  Eboko says.

Africa needs to rethink many of its basic economic assumptions and investment strategies and start spreading investment in rural and deserted regions to reduce climate induce security risk and migration, she adds.

“If most of the projects on climate change adaptation we hear about on the radio and read in publications could reach us, the farmers, directly, important farm implements the cost of farming could reduce,” Muma says.

Edited by: Nalisha Adams

The writer can be contacted at nformonde@gmail.com

David, 14, transports gallons of palm oil for his father in Penja, in Cameroon’s Littoral region. Experts say there is a strong need for a people-centred approach if growth in Cameroon is to be resilient. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Jul 24 2014 (IPS)

For the last 13 years, Michael Ndah, 37, has worked for three road construction companies in Cameroon, but it is only in the last two years that his current employer has managed to register him with the National Social Insurance Fund (CNPS). 

The CNPS is a pension system for workers in the private sector but they can only join if they are signed up by their employers. Benefits also include medical and surgical care and hospitalisation. But Ndah’s CNPS cover does not provide for his family’s health.

“When my wife goes to the hospital I cannot use my insurance card for treatment and they say I must first pay in cash,” he tells IPS.

The labour code provides that seven percent of a worker’s salary is given to CNPS each month, with the highest salary calculated by the system being 300,000 CFA (about 640 dollars) — even if the person earns above this.

It is a contributive system where 2.8 percent of the payments are covered by the employee, with the remaining contributions covered by the employer. But with 640 dollars being the maximum wage allowed by CNPS, overall pensions are low.

And it’s a huge concern for Ndah.

“I don’t know if, before my retirement, I would have contributed enough to be eligible for a monthly pension payment,” Ndah worries.

The number of working-age people who are members of the CNPS is also low. According to the United Nations, about 53.3 percent of the country’s 21.7 million people are of working age (16 to 64 years). But only about 10 percent of them are insured by the CNPS.

“All workers in the formal sector are supposed to be registered with the social insurance [CNPS] eight days after signing an employment contract but many employers do not implement this law,” John Yewoh Forchu, a general inspector at the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, tells IPS.

The high rate of unemployment here – about 30 percent – favours most employers who do not run organised work environments and are not ready to sign any form of contract with employees.

Warda Ndouvatama, a Yaounde-based civil administrator and expert on social security and protection, says that most employers falsely declare the number of workers employed by their organisations to avoid social insurance contributions.

He tells IPS that this phenomenon is not only common in Cameroon but in many African countries where more than 70 percent of the population work in the informal sector and do not have employment contracts.

“This has a big impact on the ability of people to cope with present and future eventualities,” Ndouvatama says.

While countries in Africa are enjoying higher levels of economic growth and well-being, the latest annual Human Development Report by the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP) says that countries on the continent need to intensify their fight against deprivation.

The report states that by providing an additional and predictable layer of support, social protection programmes help households avoid selling off assets, taking children out of school or postponing necessary medical care, all detrimental to their long term well-being.

“One commonly held misconception is that only wealthy countries can afford social protection or universal basic services. As this report documents, the evidence is to the contrary. Except for societies undergoing violent strife and turmoil, most societies can — and many have — put in place basic services and social protection,” the report states.

Mutale Wakunuma, the Zambia country coordinator of the Africa Platform for Social Protection, agrees.

“We all know that there is overwhelming evidence of the role social protection plays in reducing extreme poverty and helping countries recover from crises, but we need these implemented in earnest by governments,” she tells IPS, pointing out that social protection programmes that help reduce poverty are few and far between.

“This failure to implement them in earnest is why the report observes that in spite of the progress, sub-Saharan Africa is the most unequal region in the world,” she adds.

Lisa Simrique Singh, senior economist at UNDP in Yaounde, says in terms of Cameroon and the global and national discussion post 2015, the focus is on “resilience and growth that leaves no-one behind.”

“There is thus a strong need overall for a people centred approach if growth in Cameroon is to be resilient,” she tells IPS.

“To this end there is need for a systemic approach which combines macro, sectoral and micro interventions in a meaningful way that responds to the real needs of the poor. And as a policy tool, there is a strong need for social protection to be mainstreamed into the overall growth agenda of the country.

“Social security currently exists but it is only one component of it since it covers and benefits only those in the formal sector, which account for around 10 percent of the population.”

Cameroon, however, is looking to reform the CNSP. Future changes will include increasing the monthly contribution from seven to 13 percent of a person’s salary, creating a security system for informal sectors and universal health coverage that guarantees access to medical treatment even when a patient has no money.

Officials at the fund also acknowledge that if nothing is done to get more people integrated in the fund by 2020, the social security system will be grounded. This is because very few formal sector workers and no informal workers benefit from social security and the existing social security does not cover many risks.

“The social insurance fund scheme of 1974 is old and major reforms have to be done because we have [a larger] ageing population than before the 1990s. In the 1990s, 10 workers were contributing for one retired person but today 10 workers contribute for six retired persons,” Forchu says.

He explained that the system in place is a social solidarity system where those working contribute to help those who are out of activity.

“Fewer people now contribute to retired people. The cost of living and prices has increased without a relative salary increase and workers’ pensions cannot really meet the standards of life today.”

*Additional reporting by Amy Fallon in Kampala, Uganda and Friday Phiri in Lusaka, Zambia.

Fisherman in Kribi, Cameroon, say this is the last stretch of beach with enough space for them to anchor their canoes. Credit- Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS.jpg

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
KRIBI, Cameroon, Jul 24 2014 (IPS)

Pierre Zambo is a hotel manager in Kribi, a sea resort town in Cameroon’s South Region. In the past his hotel would have “more than 100 tourists each week. But today if I manage to have 50 people registered into my hotel weekly, then it’s good business.”

Located in the gulf of Guinea, Kribi is a town with an estimated population of about 50,000 whose livelihoods depend on farming, fishing and tourism.

However, rising sea levels and increased tides have eroded most of the once-sandy beach along Kribi. Now beaches are reduced to narrow muddy paths. And local hotels, bars and restaurants are feeling the impact of this erosion directly in their pockets as tourists reduce in numbers.

“Tourists come and are less interested in our beaches and prefer spending time in the forest attractions,” Zambo tells IPS.

Emmanuel Founga, a botanist, owns a hotel on Kribi’s coast."I have to make sand bags every August to October when the sea is very high to avoid further erosion of land and the danger of my walls collapsing." -- Pierre Zambo, Kribi hotel manager

“The Kribi coastline has eroded from about 50 to 100 metres since 1990. It is evident from the trees that are uprooted by waves today but were found inland some years ago,” Founga tells IPS.

He says the local population is losing an important source of livelihood as the number of tourists reduce, local restaurants and bars are beginning to close down.

“High degradation of the coast has a big implication on tourism in this region; sea level rise has caused not only erosion but has polluted the coast. Much waste from the Atlantic Ocean is swept by the sea to these beaches. The waves in return cause erosion of the banks, leaving the beaches muddy and filthy,” Founga explains.

“Climate change is having a devastating impact in Cameroon and the coast of Kribi is a perfect example of the problem of rising sea levels and the enormous impact on safety and livelihood of the population,” Tomothé Kagombet, the focal point person for the Kyoto Protocol at the Ministry of Environment Nature Protection and Sustainable Development, tells IPS.

Climate change is not only a coastal problem but has had widespread impact on this Central African nation. Across the country there are reports of limited and erratic rainfall, pests and plant diseases, erosion, high temperatures, droughts and floods.

Cameroon’s economy relies heavily on climate-sensitive sectors, mainly agriculture, energy and forestry — with 70 percent of the population depending directly on agriculture.

While Cameroon’s Ministry of Tourism is currently channeling funds from a United Nations World Tourism Organisation project called ST-EP or Sustainable Tourism – Eliminating Poverty to climate change projects along the coast, it is not enough.

Through ST-EP, various projects are being implemented in Kribi beach and its forests and along other coastal areas such as Douala and Limbe to help people adapt to the changing climate and develop their sites for tourism.

“Due the problem of a degrading coast, we are encouraging locals to also develop other touristic sites such as the forest with Baka pigmies and their rich culture, which recently has been a huge attraction. We have given funding for them to restore and  manage beaches from Kribi to Limbe and other sites,” Muhamadu Kombi, director of tourist sites in the Ministry of Tourism, tells IPS.

However, this is but one project. The concrete implementation of nationwide climate change adaptation strategies are lagging due to the absence of funding.

The National Climate Change Adaptation Plan (PENACC) provides strategies and actions to mitigate the effect of climate change, but Kagombet points out that Cameroon does not benefit from any funding from United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) negotiations.

“But one of the main problems facing Cameroon and other developing nations is the problems of implementation. We depend on funding from developed nations to better implement this elaborated adaptation plan of action.

“In this document [PENACC], Cameroon’s vulnerability is considered by sector and adaptation actions are formulated following these specificities. With the coastal ecosystem, for example, there is a need for both mechanical [building of dikes] and biological [planting of mangrove trees] means of adaptation,” Kagombet says.

An aspect of Cameroon’s planned action is the introduction of climate change as a subject in schools, with proposed syllabuses already available. The plan of action also prioritises actions in the industrial sector, waste management and transport sectors.

“It is a package with every requirement; capacity, technology and other resources needed to adapt and mitigate climate change effects,” Kagombet says.

While Cameroon plans to implement and carry out Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) projects, operational dawdling could hinge on the country’s commitments to mitigate climate change.

Meanwhile, those who have not benefited from adaptation projects in Kribi find that not only their livelihoods are threatened, but that they are constantly paying out of their own pockets to adapt to a changing climate.

“These high tides has brought many problems. I have to make sand bags every August to October when the sea is very high to avoid further erosion of land and the danger of my walls collapsing,” Zambo says.

A family from Central African Republic who fled to Cameroon’s East Region after the 2013 coup d’état that ousted President François Bozizé. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
GUIWA, Cameroon, Jun 24 2014 (IPS)

Central African Republic refugees living in Cameroon’s East Region are increasingly becoming frustrated about their deteriorating living conditions and their inability to support themselves as conflict between them and and local villagers has escalated over depleting resources.

They say they have been denied access to farm tools as aid agencies fear they may use them as arms against the local population.

Clay-Man Youkoute, head of refugees in Guiwa camp, told IPS that aid agencies showed the refugees pieces of land that they could cultivate.

“Before starting work on the land, aid agencies refused to give us the right farm tools. They say if they give us machetes we will use as weapons against local population. This is very insulting.

“We went further to toil in the bushes with unsuitable farm tools just to be denied access to the farms later,” Youkoute said, explaining that “the local chief and his population drove us from the land saying that we have no right to their land.”

Now Rosaline Kusangi, a mother of three, has resorted to harvesting wild forest fruits to earn a living. She walks five kilometres to a nearby forest to harvest wild mangoes daily. She then sells the mangoes at the Guiwa market square.

“I cannot have a farm, so I depend on wild fruits for survival but the locals still think I have no right to the fruits because I am a refugee,” Kusangi told IPS.

About 1,500 refugees have settled in Guiwa, eastern Cameroon as part of the first influx from CAR after the April 2013 coup d’état that ousted President François Bozizé. However, in May 2013 a number of refugees began abandoning the border camps because of the poor living conditions there and made their way to Guiwa village. It is estimated that over 200,000 refugees from CAR are currently in Cameroon.

But even in Guiwa refugees live in squalid conditions and in tents that are wearing out quickly. There is a lack of water and proper waste treatment facilities.

“We have been here for more than a year still living in worn-out shelters. During the dry season it is very hot inside and it leaks when it rains. Moreover, insects and snakes find their way easily into the tents,”Jodel Tanga, a CAR refugee, told IPS.

In addition to poor living conditions, infections and malaria has increased during the first two months of the rainy season.

“Each day, about 10 people are sick with malaria and stomach disorders since the rains started. All the wells that were dug by the United Nations Refugee Agency [UNHCR] have dried up or are unclean, so we have to go two kilometres to fetch water,” Juliana Manga, a CAR refugee who has taken responsibility as health assistant in the Guiwa camp, told IPS.

Access to health care is difficult, Manga said.

“When we go to the clinic, we are always the last to be served. They say we should allow the people of the land first. The nurses in hospitals make comments and gestures that are insulting.”

Manga also complained that local school authorities did not allow their children to attend school because of limited space in classrooms.

The number of refugees crossing from CAR into Cameroon has dropped from more than 10,000 a week before March to about 1,000 weekly.

But the influx has already changed the make-up of most towns in East Region.

According to Guiwa local councillor, Joseph Kwette, the local community are concerned about their own security and livelihoods since the start of the refugee influx.

“These refugees were a disgruntled group who had forcefully made their way into Guiwa despite attempts by the local population to push them back [to remain in the camps on Cameroon’s border towns]. This made the tension with the local population to subsist until today,” Kwette told IPS.

The locals’ water supply has been severely compromised. Local children are forced to travel long distances to fetch water and fire wood. The cassava tuber, which is the most consumed food in the region, has also become scarce and sells for double its price on the market.

“Lack of water in the refugee camps and deforestation by refugees has also threatened the food security of the Guiwa population who also depend on forest products and water for survival. Prices of goods has increased and petty theft is common,” Kwette said.

According to the police commander in Guiwa village, criminal activities have increased over the last year.

Refugees have been accused of being behind the recent spate of armed robberies and increasing sex trade.

In January, CAR refugees had taken hostage two United Nations aid workers to protest a lack of needed aid. In early May, a group of armed men from CAR abducted 18 civilians who were travelling in east of Cameroon.

But the refugees argue that they are simply victims of circumstances and are not given some of the basic human right to freedom of movement.

“We are seen as criminals because we don’t have identification papers. The police incriminate us and many refugees find themselves in Bertoua prison just because they attempted to move and search for jobs in the urban area. There is no paper to identity us as CAR refugees registered by the UNHCR,” said Youkoute, head of refugees at Guiwa camp.

Aid agencies in Cameroon have declared the current situation an emergency and have called for more aid.

The World Health Organisation has declared that health facilities are terribly understaffed and lack water and electricity. Humanitarian workers on the ground are over stretched and medical supplies are also running out.

The U.N. World Food Programme’s food stores are running empty and there is urgent need for funds to buy more food and nutritional supplements for malnourished children.

“The needs of refugees are colossal, the most pressing needs is that that of housing, food and health. Many more sites have been identified to host the refugees camped in villages,” Faustian Tchimi, Cameroon Red Cross director in East region, told IPS.

A poster to promote rotavirus vaccination. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS.

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDÉ, May 7 2014 (IPS)

The growing number of child deaths from diarrhoea in Cameroon has necessitated the introduction of a new vaccine (RotaTeq) designed to protect babies under five against common types of rotaviruses that cause diarrhoea. But growing skepticism over new vaccines, and lack of potable water and proper hygiene could thwart such public health efforts, experts say.

“Diarrhoea is one of the top killers of children under five in Cameroon, responsible for more than 5,800 deaths in children under five yearly,” Desire Noulna of the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) told IPS.There is suspicion and mistrust of vaccines among different communities in Cameroon.

According to GAVI, a public-private alliance to boost immunisation, rotavirus kills more than 600 children every day in Africa, and thousands more are hospitalised or require clinic visits.

Globally, rotavirus is the most usual cause of severe gastroenteritis in children, accounting for an estimated 2.4 million hospital admissions and 527,000 deaths each year. About 85 percent of these deaths occur in developing countries, mainly in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

In June 2009, based in large part on clinical trials in Africa that demonstrated vaccine efficacy in impoverished, high-mortality settings, the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended that rotavirus vaccines be included in all countries’ national immunisation programmes.

Cameroon introduced the rotavirus vaccine last month after ten other countries in Africa: Botswana, The Gambia, Ghana, Malawi, Morocco, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, South Africa, and Sudan.

According to WHO, South Africa, the first African country to introduce rotavirus vaccines into its national immunisation programme in 2009, experienced dramatic decreases of 54 to 69 percent in rotavirus hospitalisations in both rural and urban settings within two years.

In Ethiopia, the introduction of rotavirus vaccines is estimated to save 3,700 lives, and 800,000 dollars in household expenditures annually. In Ghana, rotavirus vaccines are predicted to save 1,554 lives annually, and 53 percent of treatment costs.

Cameroon will hold a national immunisation campaign in the coming months. But some experts argue that the sanitation problem in Cameroon presents a major challenge to the effectiveness of this vaccine.

“There are some neighbourhoods in our major cities that for months go without potable water. Even when supplied, the quality is very doubtful,” says Obed Fung, health expert at the Foretia Foundation that supports development in Cameroon.

According to the African Development Bank (ADB), only about 45 percent of the rural population has access to drinking water against 77 percent in urban areas. An estimated 13.5 percent of rural people have access to proper hygiene and sanitation compared to 17 percent in urban areas.

Women and girls shoulder the largest burden in collecting water; 15 percent of urban and 18 percent of rural populations have to rely on improved drinking water sources more than 30 minutes walk away. It is mostly girls and women who have to fetch the water.

“Poor access to water and sanitation could hinder the success of this campaign but it is important that we focus on water-borne illnesses especially diarrhoeal diseases and seek ways of curbing outbreaks,” Noulna said. “While the country may be facing water scarcity and poor hygiene, there is a need to avoid the worst case scenario of a sudden outbreak.”

But there is suspicion and mistrust of vaccines among different communities in Cameroon.

“The national immunisation programme in Cameroon now administers nine different vaccines for children and the public think that this treatment is exaggerated. It is always the case because they do not understand the public health risk of having just one victim with a viral attack,” Dr. Paul Onambele at the district hospital in capital Yaounde told IPS.

Rumours have been circulated that public health officials were administering vaccines to sterilise women, Onambele said.

A study by the EPI found that 33 percent of families are opposed to vaccination of children and pregnant women due to religious and traditional beliefs.

“These controversies over the efficacy, safety, and morality of immunisation have continued to impede vaccination efforts in Cameroon, most especially in the northern part of Cameroon which is greatly influenced by beliefs stemming from Nigerian communities against vaccination,” Onambele said.

Haman Alima, a nursing mother in a Yaounde neighbourhood says: “I grew up and we never used to be vaccinated but we are all fine. I only vaccinate my child because I cannot refuse while in the hospital.”

Such attitudes are dangerous. “Our country is in turbulent times with a drop in immunisation coverage, inequality in coverage among districts and cities, and most importantly, the recent resurgence of polio,” Clarisse Loe Loumou from GAVI told IPS.

According to EPI, 62 percent of the health centres do not involve local associations and NGOs in the promotion of vaccination.

However, GAVI and EPI intend to achieve a 90 percent level of involvement by increasing efforts already made by using civil society platforms to reach communities and give local people ownership over vaccination.

Child refugees from Central African Republic in Cameroon’s eastern border town of Garoua-Boula share a plate of rice in the early morning. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
Garoua-Boula, Cameroon, Mar 18 2014 (IPS)

Abdul Karim arrived in Cameroon’s eastern border town of Garoua-Boula from Central African Republic’s Yaloke district at the end of February as part the largest influx of refugees into Cameroon.

In February, some 30,000 refugees — the largest number since the crisis began in CAR last March — crossed the border into Cameroon, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR). And the small border town of Garoua-Boulai is struggling to meet the basic needs of both refugees and local residents.“Over 100 trucks came in from CAR with refugees yesterday and some are already arriving today.” -- Ngotio Koeke, the Cameroon Army Commander in Garoua-Boulai

Since their arrival, Karim and 32 members of his family, have been sharing 50-square-metre UNHCR tent, in a temporary refugee camp called Pont-Bascule, in Garoua-Boulai.

“I am here with my two wives, my children, my brother’s children and my mother. We left CAR with nothing. We solely depend on UHNCR for our needs,” he told IPS.

Karim and thousands of others of refugees are waiting for UNHCR Cameroon to register them and find them places to live. According to UNHCR aid workers, several citizens from Chad and Nigeria who were in CAR and fled the violence are currently in Garoua-Boulai.

Violence between Séléka-aligned Muslims and and the anti-Balaka Christian vigilante militias has killed two thousand people and displaced a quarter of the country’s four million population since Séléka rebels staged a coup last March. It is estimated that almost 130,000 refugees from CAR are currently in Cameroon.

Many of the refugees enter Cameroon’s eastern border town of Garoua-Boula by travelling on the cargo trucks that make deliveries to CAR’s capital, Bangui from Cameroon. Courtesy: Monde Kingsley Nfor

The number fleeing CAR increases daily. Each day hundreds of container trucks from Cameroon’s Douala International Airport make their way into CAR along the Garoua-Boulai highway. And each day almost a hundred trucks return to Garoua-Boulai carrying mainly Muslim refugees brutalised by the anti-Balaka Christian militia.

“Over 100 trucks came in from CAR with refugees yesterday and some are already arriving today. This has been the case since February,” Ngotio Koeke, the Cameroon Army Commander in Garoua-Boulai, told IPS.

Adamu Usman, a truck driver told IPS: “We have been transporting many refugees each time we offload the trucks and return to Cameroon from Bangui [CAR’s capital].”

“I can’t estimate how many refugees my truck carries but it could be close to a hundred people.”

He explained that during his most recent trip to CAR, he witnessed some of the most heart-breaking tragedies.

“A pregnant woman on board my truck suddenly began having labour pain and lost her baby before we reached Cameroon,” Usman said.

He explained that when they reached an anti-Balaka blockade and were forced to stop “the anti-Balaka young men entered the truck” and left soon after without harassing anyone because they saw “this woman lying down in blood with a dead baby by her.”

Most of the refugees are indigenous Mbororo people from western and northern CAR who have been targeted by militia groups for their wealth and livestock.

“We did not even know who Séléka was, but now we are the ones to suffer. It is not fair for every Muslim to be hated. We do not even look like the Chadian Muslims in CAR but they still attack us,” a Mbororo refugee named Abdul told IPS.

Abdul says even if the violence stops, he won’t return home.

“I don’t have anything. I left behind a herd of cattle. I will not get it back if I ever go back.”

While adults in the camp worry about the uncertain future that awaits them and their large families in Cameroon, children can be seen staying close to their mothers, sharing meals from common trays, while others play, enjoying their new environment and having numerous playmates.

But the situation in Garoua-Boulai is far from idyllic. The town’s mayor Esther Yaffo Ndoe told IPS that their small community does not have the capacity to deal with the refugees.

“Garoua-Boulia is town with a population of just 40,000 but today we are close to 80,000 people because of CAR crisis … the present needs of the town in terms of health, food and shelter exceed the capacity of the local administration and aid agencies. Refugees have been staying in the temporary site for more than two months today waiting to be transferred on,” Ndoe said.

She said amid the influx of refugees, it was becoming difficult for locals to survive “as scarce resources are now shared with refugees.”

Food has become scarce and the prices of goods and services are increasing. There has been an upsurge in prices of basic foods like rice and maize. A kilogram of rice that used to sell for one dollar, now sells for 1.50 dollars. Maize has increased from 80 cents to one dollar per kg.

But Ndoe complained that the presence of the refugees has increased insecurity and also juvenile delinquency in the town.

Buba, 24, a local farmer and a motorcycle rider in Garoua-Boulai, told IPS that his farm had been vandalised by some of the refugees.

“The sticks I used in the fencing on my farm have been partly destroyed by refugees. My farm is now exposed to cattle [who eat the crop]. Some of the refugees are harvesting premature crops from people’s farms.”

However, many of the refugees are engaged in petty trading, selling firewood and basic foodstuffs to their fellow refugees and to local residents for their survival.

But the health of the refugees is also a concern as many have problems related to malnutrition, diarrhoea, gastrointestinal disorders and malaria, according to Médecins sans Frontières (MSF).

“Until the refugees are settled in camps and have access to clean water, sanitation, food and shelter there is also risk of epidemics of cholera, measles and malaria. These risks are increased as the rains have started and vaccination is needed,” Jon Irwin, MSF’s head of Mission to Cameroon, told IPS.

He explained that they were focusing on caring for children suffering from acute malnutrition. According to UNHCR, 51 percent of the refugees from CAR in Cameroon are children under the age of 11.

“Malnourished children are more vulnerable to malaria and chest infections and this is exactly the trend we see with the Central African refugees in Cameroon,” Irwin said.

MSF has called for urgent mobilisation of humanitarian actors and stakeholders so that the necessary resources are made available to the refugee population who are scattered across Cameroon’s border. The MSF mobile clinic, which provides assistance to refugees in different towns and villages along Cameroon’s border, attends to about 70 people daily.

“Logistically, it is also difficult for our teams to provide care to refugees who are disseminated in several locations. We want to provide health care to a maximum number of people but we spend a lot of time travelling in order to access the refugees who need us more,” Irwin said.

The Cameroon government says that the uncontrolled number of health clinics and training institutions are responsible for the death and worsening medical conditions of many here. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Jan 23 2014 (IPS)

The Cameroonian government has begun a crackdown on illegal medical facilities and plans to shut down more than 524 medical training centres and 600 private clinics operating unlawfully in this Central African nation. 

“We are starting activities to bring order to the medical sector that has gone out of control. Most of [the illegal medical institutions] lack the training, appropriate staff, equipment and infrastructure to operate either as a medical training institution or a clinic,” Biwole Sida, the national health inspector in the Ministry of Public Health, told IPS.

“The uncontrolled number of clinics and training institutions are responsible for the death and worsening medical conditions of many innocent Cameroonians,” Sida added.

In the student residential area of Bonamusadi, in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, IPS visited one such clinic that is open 24 hours a day and which provides a wide array of medical services, including prenatal and paediatric care.

But a patient who was rushed to this private clinic with burn wounds was turned away and taken to the nearby government hospital, Yaounde Central Hospital, as the clinic has stopped admitting emergency patients.

“We now operate only by appointment since the government announced [it was] closing down clinics,” Helen Evinga, the clinic attendant, told IPS.

Francois Penda, a medical officer at the emergency unit of the Yaounde Central Hospital, who attended to the burn patient transferred there by the private clinic, explained that it would not be a bad thing if the illegal clinics were shut down.

“Most patients come to the hospital on the verge of death after they wasted time in small private clinics, which are not even equipped technically and professionally to handle emergency cases,” he told IPS.

“A [burn] accident like this is so complicated and requires very delicate and sophisticated medical resources. Any unprepared attempt [to treat the wound] will complicate the patient’s chances of recovery,” Penda said.

Costs of Public Health Care Prohibitive

However, some private clinic operators claim they are providing a much-needed service as the cost of medical care in government hospitals and clinics is prohibitive.

“There is a great need for the services of private clinics in Cameroon. The government structures fell short to satisfy all classes of patients, and are usually saturated with patients, making it difficult for them to receive fair treatment,” Maxwel Fonyu, a laboratory technician and owner of small clinic in Yaounde, told IPS.

He argued that millions of people living in urban slums depend on the affordable medical assistance provided by these private clinics.

“In my clinic, for example, instead of demanding 10 dollars for a malaria test like in big hospitals, I only charge them one dollar to conduct malaria tests, and prescribe and sell medicines that are affordable and vital for their treatment,” Fonyu said.

Illegal Clinics Government’s Fault

Bidjogo Atangana, secretary-general of Cameroon’s National Medical Council, told IPS that the existence of the illegal and ill-equipped clinics was partially because of the government’s liberalisation of the sector some two decades ago.

“In the 1990s people were authorised to open health clinics as a Common Initiative Group (CIG) [a non-profit], which is one of the easiest means to acquire a licence for such ventures,” Atangana said.

Today the National Medical Council wants all medical centres that have been operating as CIGs to close down and obtain proper qualifications and medical licences, which many do not have.

“Nobody will hence own such a structure without authority from the Cameroon National Medical Council, and the training offered in some health institutions must also be checked,” Atangana said.

But according to Etienne Tsou from the health science faculty at Cameroon’s Catholic University, there is a need to regulate more than just the clinics, as most training institutions operate illicitly.

“I don’t see how a medical professional can be trained on the job and not have a formal education. Most retired nurses and doctors think they are qualified to open their own centres and train others when they don’t have what it takes,” he told IPS.

“The sector may lack qualified professionals, but putting the lives of innocent citizens in the hands of charlatans will lead to a bigger public health problem. There are, however, many Cameroonians with good graduate diplomas but their services are exported to countries that pay higher [salaries].”

Lack of Trained Staff

According to the Ministry of Health, about 5,000 Cameroonian medical doctors are currently plying their trade abroad.

Tetanye Ekoe, the vice president of the National Order of Medical Doctors in Cameroon, said that out of 4,200 medical doctors residing in Cameroon, only about half are practicing as medical doctors.

Of the other half, about 1,000 are on secondment to the Ministry of Health where they perform mostly administrative tasks. The remaining 1,100 are either with the Faculty of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Yaoundé I, with NGOs or the private sector.

More than 500 medical doctors and 5,000 nurses graduate annually in Cameroon.

But Ekoe explained that the limited number of practicing medical doctors in the country makes the World Health Organisation doctor-patient ratio of one doctor per 10,000 inhabitants unrealistic in Cameroon – a country of about 21 million people.

“The real ratio is closer to one doctor per 40,000 inhabitants, and in remote areas such as the Far North and Eastern Provinces, the ratio is closer to one doctor per 50,000 inhabitants,” Ekoe said.

Women from the small village of Nshi-o-doh in Ndu, North West Region, Cameroon. Currently, the land tenure system in Cameroon makes it difficult for private individuals to acquire title deeds. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDÉ, Dec 5 2013 (IPS)

Lydia Njang, a widow and mother of five from Cameroon’s North West Region, has lost her farmland three times. 

The first time was when her husband died and her in-laws inherited his land. Although they gave her use of another plot of land, she had to give that up when her brother-in-law married. After that she was allowed to farm on a third plot of land, but this was eventually sold.

“I’m left with a very small plot of 150 square metres, where I can only grow corn. But this is not even enough to feed my family. Before I had farms in very fertile places and I used to sell my surplus harvest, but I no longer have the right to farm there,” Njang told IPS.

Mary Fosi from the Myrianthus Fosi Foundation, a local NGO involved in promoting a sustainable environment in Cameroon, told IPS that Njang’s experience was a common one in this West African nation.

“The rich buy large portions of land for investment, leaving the poor community members, most especially women, with nothing to farm on and [leaving] poor people to fight over the remaining small pieces of land,” Fosi said.

Though Cameroon’s economy is experiencing positive growth of about 4.9 percent, it is clear that gains from this have not been equitably distributed.

The African Economic Outlook states that although Cameroon has abundant natural resources “revenues obtained from the exploitation of these resources, and from oil in particular, have not been sufficiently channelled into structural investments in infrastructure and the productive sectors.”“It empowers [people] to have a direct and collective community voice, which is much stronger than isolated individuals or the thoughts of civil society groups." -- Deborah Rogers, the global coordinator of the Equity and Sustainability Field Hearings

Of Cameroon’s estimated 20 million people, 8.1 million live in rural areas, only 14 percent of whom have access to electricity. It is significantly lower than urban areas where, according to the World Bank, 65 to 88 percent of the population have access to electricity.

Celestin Ondoa, a sub-director and rural development engineer at Cameroon’s Department of Rural Engineering and Improvement of the Rural Living Environment, told IPS that if the poor were to benefit from any socio-economic growth, it was vital that they had a say in the decisions that affected them.

“In the past stakeholders, including vulnerable women, youth, indigenous people and other marginalised groups have been excluded from the formulation and planning of development activities,” Ondoa said.

“Communities in Cameroon lack access to basic services and are marginalised from social and economic opportunities. These populations grapple with land conflict, poorly-equipped infrastructure, corruption and land grabbing, which is aggravated by environmental degradation,” she added.

According to Princely Njong, an organiser of the Equity and Sustainability Field Hearings outreach events for local communities, Cameroonians want land reform to be part of a policy of poverty reduction.

The Equity and Sustainability Field Hearings is a project by Initiative for Equality, a global research and advocacy NGO, that provides ways for the poorest and most excluded communities to speak out and influence global dialogue and policy on sustainable development.

“Local communities want development to be concretely supported by the provision of clinics, roads, schools, and access to land, agricultural inputs and markets,” Njong told IPS.

Currently, the land tenure system in Cameroon makes it difficult for private individuals to acquire title deeds, as it is a costly, long administrative procedure that only the wealthy can afford. According to the 1974 Land Law, all unregistered land in Cameroon is classified as national land, which belongs to the state. This includes farmland and communal land held under customary law.

According to a United States Agency for International Development country profile on Cameroon’s property rights, titled “Property Rights and Resource Governance”, “only approximately three percent of rural land is registered, mostly in the names of owners of large commercial farms.”

Cameroon has also had a number of cases of land grabbing with hundreds of thousands of hectares of land being taken away from local communities.

In Ocean Division, southern Cameroon, the government leased much of the local forestland, about 47,000 hectares, to international company United Forest Cameroon. In 2012 the government agreed to return 14,000 hectares to the 18 local communities in the area.

In the Korup National Park in southwest Cameroon, a New York-based agricultural company, Herakles Farms, has been planning to start an oil palm plantation on 73,000 hectares.

And in the North West region of Cameroon, millionaire ranch owner Alhadji Baba Ahmadou Danpullo has been accused by the indigenous Mbororo community of seizing their land. The Mbororo people are traditionally pastoral nomads.

But Deborah Rogers, the global coordinator of the Equity and Sustainability Field Hearings, told IPS they have “found a way to bring the very poor and marginalised communities directly into the regional and global debates.”

“This is not research but an effort to empower people. It empowers them to have a direct and collective community voice, which is much stronger than isolated individuals or the thoughts of civil society groups,” she said.

In the small agrarian village of Nshi-o-doh in Ndu, North West Region, Irene Kimbi knows what would improve her life – the re-introduction of a farming cooperative to her village. The community of about 1,500 people cultivates beans, maize and potatoes.

“It could help us cope with farming and market difficulties and will also reduce poverty in our community,” she told IPS.

In markets and on roadsides across Yaoundé, counterfeit and illegal drugs are stacked on wooden racks and tables, openly displayed for sale. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Sep 5 2013 (IPS)

When Francois Biloa fell ill with malaria, his family did what they had always done in the past – they gave him anti-malaria drugs and antibiotics bought from the local market. Only when his condition worsened and he became bedridden and fell unconscious, did his family take him to a local clinic in Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé.

According to the clinic’s health attendant, six out of every 10 patients there had been using illegal or counterfeit drugs readily available in this Central African nation’s market place prior to admittance.

“We bought medicine from a store because it worked for us with [previous] malaria attacks and it is very affordable. With just about two dollars we usually afford a [fake] Coartem packet, which is a full treatment for malaria,” Biloa tells IPS from his hospital bed.“Self-medication [with illegal and counterfeit drugs] result in common health problems in local hospitals and the worst of these cases are in hospitals found in poor neighbourhoods and rural communities where the poverty level is very high and access to a doctor is costly." -- Williams Takang from the Yaoundé University Teaching Hospital

In pharmacies, a packet of Coartem costs seven to eight dollars, while on the illicit market a packet can be bought for less than three dollars. A medical consultation costs four dollars on average.

“But in this hospital, I am told my bill is now over 75 dollars. The doctor says that I have a resistant strain of malaria and also typhoid fever,” Biloa says.

“I felt like I was dying during my attempted treatment at home. I only started regaining energy and full consciousness after [coming to] this clinic.”

In markets and on roadsides across Yaoundé, fake and illegal drugs are stacked on wooden racks and tables, openly displayed for sale. Trading in these drugs is illegal. The are available as a result of weak regulation, poor health services and high medical costs.

There are no precise figures on the quantity of illegal drugs entering Cameroon, but up to 70 percent of drugs sold here are traded on the black market, says Christophe Ampoam of the National Council of the Pharmaceutical Society of Cameroon.

According to Ampoam, this trade in illicit medication is so well organised that government officials and the police are helpless to halt it.

“The trade in illicit drugs in Cameroon operates like a very powerful mafia-like network, which is very difficult to dismantle. It is estimated that investment in illicit sales of medicines is five times more lucrative than through the regular system. Local officials dread dismantling the network because it has also infiltrated the judicial and customs system,” Ampoam tells IPS.

“Corrupt regulatory and legal systems are easily exploited by criminal smugglers and additional rules have only increased corruption.”

Ampoam says that most of the counterfeit drugs are made in the Middle East and East and South Asia, yet many carry the inscription ‘Made in Germany’. They are smuggled into Cameroon by sea and through the porous borders this country shares with Nigeria and the Central African Republic.

“Although it is difficult to give an exact statistic on the percentage of illicit drugs found in local markets today, the availability of drugs in local markets, makeshift shops, on the streets and along the highways tells of the deplorable situation in Cameroon,” he says.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that worldwide 200,000 deaths per annum could be prevented if people did not use counterfeit drugs. According to the International Policy Network report, fake tuberculosis and malaria drugs alone are estimated to kill 700,000 people globally each year.

“Most of the drugs in circulation have been banned in certain countries because they are toxic or counterfeit. Some have the correct ingredients but in low quantities. Some of the drugs are samples or medicines donated by NGOs,” Ampoam explains.

Marlise Loudang, director of the pharmaceutical inspection service at the ministry of public health says that government teams in every region across the country are clamping down on the illegal trade, but so far efforts have been unsuccessful.

“Self-medication [with illegal and counterfeit drugs] is a big public health problem in Cameroon that affects almost every family. This stems from the easy access to drugs of doubtful origin and quality all over the national territory,” Loudang tells IPS.

Marcel Olinga is a vendor of counterfeit and illegal drugs and says that even though authorities have raided him, it has not deterred him from continuing. “Once in a while the police come around and seize my drugs, but it is a loss worth incurring because the raids are not regular and our main stocks are never where we sell.”

Olinga says he makes about 40 dollars a day.

“We receive many customers daily. Some come with prescriptions from doctors others seek our advice before buying and some simply demand what they want,” he tells IPS.

According the WHO, there are 13,514 patients for every doctor in Cameroon, although some say the ratio is higher, especially in rural areas. Poverty also limits many from seeking medication from hospitals and health clinics.

“Some patients run from costs of consultation in hospitals and fall in the hands of illegal drug vendors who are ready to sell drugs at prices far more below the legal market price,” Williams Takang from the Yaoundé University Teaching Hospital tells IPS.

“Self-medication [with illegal and counterfeit drugs] results in common health problems in local hospitals and the worst of these cases are in hospitals found in poor neighbourhoods and rural communities where the poverty level is very high and access to a doctor is costly,” he says.

“The intake of fake and illegal medicines can lead to life-threatening consequences especially for diseases with high mortality rates like malaria. Unfortunately most of the patients suffering from these common diseases put themselves on medication without any prior medical consultations,” Takang says.

The Menchum Falls in Cameroon could be a great opportunity for REDD and ecotourism says Joseph Amougou, from the National REDD Coordination in the Ministry of Environment and Nature Protection and Sustainable Development. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Aug 8 2013 (IPS)

Uncertainty over property rights and access to forest land is potentially a major stumbling block for implementing the United Nations collaborative initiative on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation in Cameroon.

In Adjab, an indigenous village in the southern region of Cameroon, Chief Marcelin Biang told IPS he feels the present regulations are pushing locals to damage the forest in order to establish their claim to it.

Following a land dispute between Adjab residents and a timber company, a piece of their land was given back to them – but on condition that the villagers “show proof” they are using the land to sustain their livelihoods.

Biang said that they depend on the forest for hunting, growing vegetables and collecting wood. Farming large plots of land is not part of their culture, but now they must learn to grow oil plams and rubber trees to be able to keep their land.

“We are confused about what to do,” said Biang. “They ask us to conserve the forest, but when we do, timber exploiters come in.”“Even if REDD+ doesn’t bring the money, let it bring good governance.” -- Augustine Njamnshi, of the NGO Bioresources Development and Conservation Programme Cameroon

Cameroon’s plans to implement and successfully carry out REDD projects will hinge on the country resolving long-standing challenges in managing forests and other natural resources.

In January, this Central African nation’s plans for REDD programmes were approved by the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF).

“Forest countries can receive payments for stocking carbon, but this must result from effective planning and implementation of the Readiness Preparation Proposal (RPP),” Serge Menang, senior environment specialist with FCPF in Cameroon told IPS.

The FCPF granted Cameroon 3.6 million dollars towards implementation of its RPP, which sets out the national strategy.

Countries in the global South hope to receive significant payments from polluters in the North in exchange for conserving and expanding forest cover. Trees hold stocks of carbon, which would otherwise be released into the atmosphere, where it would contribute to global warming through the greenhouse effect.

REDD schemes are meant to reward preservation of forests with carbon credits, which can be sold to polluting companies in the North wishing to offset their harmful emissions. REDD+ extends the concept of rewarding carbon storage beyond forests and plantations to include agriculture.

“Cameroon’s REDD+ strategy is based on a national vision of making REDD+ a tool for the socioeconomic development of the nation. It must be used to better the livelihood of communities,” Joseph Amougou, from the National REDD Coordination in the Ministry of Environment and Nature Protection and Sustainable Development told IPS.

Achieving this vision will require addressing existing governance challenges, including reviewing and strengthening policy and ensuring informed, meaningful participation by forest-dependent communities – particularly by marginalised groups in rural areas such as women and indigenous peoples.

“REDD will not work in Cameroon without development from below. It cannot be implemented without accounting for the activities of the local population who practise agriculture, forest exploitation and livestock farming. REDD should improve their activities and living conditions so that these local communities don’t put as much pressure on the forest,” Amougou said.

“For example, in the northern part of Cameroon where the problem is energy [from firewood and charcoal], REDD must prioritise the energy needs of the people.”

Several platforms are already in place to support this type of participation. The National Steering Committee – which includes representation of indigenous peoples – brings relevant government ministries together with civil society organisations and NGOs, while the REDD and Climate Change Platform provides civil society and local communities with an independent coordinating body.

Haman Unusa is from the Ministry of Environment and Nature Protection and Sustainable Development’s National REDD+ Coordination Unit, the body responsible for technical functions including meetings and consultation. He told IPS that indigenous peoples participated in consultations throughout the process of developing the RPP. This will continue in the implementation phase.

“The indigenous peoples will participate through their own various organisations. The indigenous peoples also represent themselves in regional and community branches of the REDD and Climate Change Platform,” Unusa said.

“A roadmap for integrating gender in the REDD+ process has been developed and will be enhanced as part of the development of the strategy. Women are also represented on the national bodies – in fact, one of the managerial positions of the national coordination is reserved for a woman,” said the official.

Unusa added that the communications strategy in the implementation phase will include the use of local languages and visual forms of communication such as posters and billboards. Translators and interpreters will also be used to facilitate two-way communication between REDD+ facilitators and local people.

Yet these plans for enhanced communications may point to shortcomings in the process so far. According to Aehshatu Manu, who has represented indigenous Mbororo women in the FCPF meetings, many local women are still unaware of what REDD seeks to achieve, and fear they will lose access to the forest for such things as building materials, medicinal plants and food.

“Despite the participation of our men and women in meetings,” she told IPS, “effective participation is yet to be achieved through the communications strategy that is in place. REDD is still misunderstood by local communities.”

Amougou said that policy makers are “facing a number of challenges in designing and implementing REDD strategies and policies.”

“REDD is new, but it must be built on existing assets and insights from previous policy interventions. REDD can be realised with the national policies, institutions and actions already in place,” he said.

Another threat to implementation comes from a lack of financial resources. The 3.6 million dollars from the FCPF is welcome, but the total budget for Cameroon’s RPP is 28 million dollars, and it is not yet clear where this money will come from.

“To be able to close such financial gaps, Cameroon’s REDD+ strategies should rely on already existing resources such as forest inventory data, REDD feasibility studies of drivers of deforestation and conservation efforts,” Menang said. “And the government and other development partners must support the process financially.”

Finding the rest of the money required may be a challenge, but Augustine Njamnshi of the NGO Bioresources Development and Conservation Programme Cameroon sees benefits even if those funds are not found. “Even if REDD+ doesn’t bring the money, let it bring good governance.”

Kiribi is a local beach resort town, but a mega 567-million dollar seaport is being built there. However, analysts caution that locals will miss out on important employment opportunities because of a lack of skills. Credit: TheMaramatanga/CC by 2.0

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Aug 1 2013 (IPS)

The Kribi Seaport on the coast of southern Cameroon is destined to become a mega harbour to serve all of Central Africa. But there is little chance that locals, particularly engineers and scientists, will benefit much from the 567 million dollar development. 

With Cameroon only providing 15 percent of the construction cost and China funding the remaining 85 percent, the port is presently under construction by the China Harbour Engineering Company.

But experts say that Cameroonians lack the professional training that is needed to work on these projects and will miss out on important employment opportunities.

“Despite Chinese investment in terms of infrastructure and technology, [this will not] benefit the growing educated and unemployed population in Cameroon who lack the appropriate professional training to be absorbed by these projects. At the moment the country needs … engineers, doctors, and scientists,” Mengnjo Anselm Sahngeh, an economic policy analyst in Cameroon, tells IPS."The Kribi Seaport could be a real lever to the industrialisation of Cameroon and the competitiveness of its products as the country will remain a regional access door to the sea for countries like Chad and Central African Republic." -- economic policy analyst Mengnjo Anselm Sahngeh

The World Bank’s 2009 Cameroon Economic Update stated that the country has an unemployment rate of 30 percent, most of whom are unemployed youth with either degrees or diplomas from higher education institutions.

According to the organisation’s 2013 Cameroon Economic Update Reducing Poverty, Vulnerability, and Risks – Special Issue on Social Safety Nets, this country’s economy grew five percent in 2012. But its overall poverty rate, which is close to 40 percent, has not declined but actually increased in some areas.

“Poor infrastructure, an unfavourable business environment, and weak governance continue to hamper economic activity and make it difficult to reach the growth rates needed to reduce poverty in a sustainable manner,” the report stated.

The deep-sea harbour, which is situated in the south region’s beach resort town Kribi, currently employs 1,125 people, 609 of them Cameroonians mostly employed as manual labourers.

Daline-Louise Nsomotto of the Kribi seaport project coordination unit in the ministry of economy, planning and regional development tells IPS that the port will handle import and export of heavy goods.

“This will fill the gaps of the [neighbouring] Douala seaport, which is only six to seven metres in depth and can only receive vessels with a capacity of 15,000 tonnes. Upon completion, the main port in Kribi, which is 16-25 metres in depth, will receive big vessels of close to 100,000 tonnes,” Nsomotto says.

An industrial complex that will allow for a multipurpose docking port with 20 different terminals, an air base, an industrial site and a private residential area is also being built. “It is a new city that will be established,” Nsomotto adds.

Frank Guet is a local businessman in Kribi. He says that despite the fact that Cameroonians had little to do with the development of the port, which started in December 2010, it had improved business in the town.

“The seaport project has increased business and employment opportunities in this zone although prices of particular commodities, such as land and houses, have skyrocketed. Many are migrating towards the area where the port is being constructed demanding land for acquisition,” Guet tells IPS.

Nsomotto says that the project’s priority is to use local skilled workers. “But local training schools do not satisfy the need of the present projects in Cameroon.

“However, the transfer of technology is highly recommended by the government to enable continuity by local engineers after the project is delivered. To achieve this, we encourage the few young Cameroonian engineers to be [employed] alongside the foreign experts from China and other countries on the project,” Nsomotto says.

According to the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, Cameroon currently ranks 63rd of 74 developing countries in terms of the level of technical skill development in the country.

Sahngeh points out that many developing countries are skipping the necessary steps of development and moving straight to large-scale industrialisation without building the essential institutions or training people to accommodate these developments.

David Esseck Sany, director of training and professional orientation at the ministry of employment and vocational training tells IPS that Cameroon suffered the consequences of the brain-drain that is still plaguing most African countries.

“There is a gap in Cameroon in terms of trained engineers and technical professionals. In order to fill these gaps we are urging and even forcing firms to train their own workers to fit the needs of the industry.”

According to Sany, most of the large projects being built in Cameroon are in areas of work that demand the type of technical expertise that cannot be found locally.

“Many higher learning institutions are being oriented today by the government to offer training in areas such as mining, high-tech engineering, energy, water and agriculture. This is to enable the implementation of the 30/70 law [of hiring 30 percent of foreigners and 70 percent of Cameroonians on a project] in all industries as much as possible,” Sany adds.

But the transfer of skills to Cameroonians might still be difficult to achieve on Chinese-driven projects where it is reported that Chinese workers even undertake basic tasks like driving trucks.

“It is very difficult to work with the Chinese when you don’t understand their language. [However], many Cameroonians are now learning the language in order to be incorporated in their projects,” Sany explains.

Regardless of the Kribi seaport’s shortfalls, Sahngeh says that the project remains a great opportunity for the socio-economic development of the region.

He says no sub-regional community can prosper without reliable infrastructural linkages and no country can be industrialised without a viable port infrastructure, be it sea or air.

“The first phase of the project is 60 percent completed and, once realised, the Kribi port will become a hub of economic and trade activities in the whole region… The Kribi seaport could be a real lever to the industrialisation of Cameroon and the competitiveness of its products as the country will remain a regional access door to the sea for countries like Chad and Central African Republic,” he says.

However, he cautions that this will be difficult unless Cameroonians receive the necessary skills and training to benefit from this. “It is unclear how this is logistically possible given the shortage of Cameroonians available to fulfil roles requiring technical skills that could attract foreign investment and foreign companies to engage in joint ventures with locals,” Sahngeh says.

The victims of the Lake Nyos poisonous gas explosion and their descendants have been living in seven resettlement camps near the area. These children live in the Upkwa camp in Menchum Division, North West Region, Cameroon. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
MENCHUM DIVISION, Cameroon, Jul 17 2013 (IPS)

Ismaela Muhamadu was six years old when he lost his parents and siblings in a poisonous gas explosion at northern Cameroon’s Lake Nyos. The blast killed more than 1,800 people, and 3,000 cattle and wildlife over a 25-km radius.

But now, 27 years later, the 33-year-old, who has two wives and eight children, is still living in the Upkwa resettlement camp in Menchum Division, North West Region. For almost three decades, the victims of the gas explosion and their descendants, who now number 12,000, have been living in mud huts in seven camps that lack basic health, education and other facilities.

In 1986, Lake Nyos released poisonous amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that scientists believe was a result of volcanic activity in the lake.

Adolphe Lele Lafrique, governor of the North West Region and head of Lake Nyos Disaster Local Management Committee, assured state media Cameroon Radio and Television last month that the Lake Nyos victims would soon be returning to the area, but many are sceptical of this promise.

“I don’t trust these promises to relocate. I’ve been 27 years in this camp and we still lack basic necessities such as hospitals, water and sustainable livelihood support. I don’t think life there will be any better,” Muhamadu told IPS.

Many struggle to survive in these camps. People of these traditionally pastoral communities have been forced to take up farming on small plots of land in order to earn a living.

“As the Boboro people, all we know is cattle grazing. But when we came to the camp we had no other choice than to become farmers, but many cannot survive on farming because Bororo people dislike farming,” Salifu Buba, 57, who lives in the Kumfutu camp in Menchum Division told IPS. But he does not want to return to what was once his home.

“I would rather suffer here than die in Nyos. What we need is support, not relocation. We don’t have rights to grazing land, the 30 to 50 square metres allotted to each household is not even enough for farming, not to mention grazing,” Buba said.

Buba explained that when the community from Lake Nyos was relocated in 1986, the government gave the traditional pastoralists tools and oxen for farming – something they knew very little about.

He thinks the government should have given them a more sustainable solution to their problems by giving each family one or two cows to raise.

At the Ipalim refugee camp opinion differs. Some of the local Bantu community, who are subsistence farmers and depend on the sales of cash crops such as maize, beans, cocoyam and plantains for their livelihoods, are keen to return to Nyos.

Stephen Nju, 47, told IPS: “I would like to go back to the land of abundance, because with the few square metres of land that each family was allotted in the camps, it is difficult to practise farming. We do beg farmland from the community that accepted us here, but we are always regarded as strangers and we have several incidents of farmer-grazer conflicts.”

Lydia Nzeh, 55, who is also from Ipalim camp, told IPS that she did not want to remain in the camp as it was very isolated and did not have basic services.

“We learnt that so much work is going on in Nyos to degas the lake and fortify the dam and that the surrounding areas now look so beautiful. But we are still waiting for the promises of returning to Nyos to be realised. This camp site is so isolated, we don’t have access roads and health centres.”

Many say the announcement to relocate about 80 percent of the 12,000 victims is delusive, that the site is not prepared, nor will it be ready to accommodate victims anytime soon.

David Neng of Environment Watch, a local NGO in Menchum Division, told IPS that the announcement to resettle victims in Nyos is questionable.

“A lot more needs to be done on the infrastructure side such as building infrastructures and public utilities that will accommodate people. Problems related to land rights and the distribution of natural resources to victims and those that rush to settle in Nyos some years after the tragedy need to be solved,” Neng said.

Engineers have reduced the gas emanating from this lake to a safe level.

Njilah Isaac Konfor, a geologist and former coordinator of a 2008 to 2010 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Cameroon government project to reintegrate the victims of the lake disaster, said that the gas levels in the lake no longer pose a danger to the community. “The government of Cameroon has made great efforts in degassing the lake and at the moment is using a very sophisticated method to make the area safe for the return of the population,” he told IPS.

He, however, questioned the idea of relocating people to the area.

“I have a problem with the announcement to relocate victims to the site, efforts have rather been slow if we consider that the disaster happened 27 years ago and the survivors have been living in these makeshift camps for this long.”

A rehabilitation programme for the area was estimated to cost about 43.8 million dollars, and was to be funded by the Cameroon government and its partners, the UNDP and the European Union. The money was also supposed to cover the cost of providing infrastructure for the rehabilitation and relocation process over five years, beginning in 2007. But the funding parties only committed 16.1 million dollars.

The programme proposed that for the rehabilitation of Lake Nyos, about 500 homes, two markets, five primary schools, two secondary schools, two hospitals, roads, potable water and electricity infrastructures were supposed to be constructed on the site.

Konfor, who visited Nyos two months ago, said none of this has been realised.

But Jeanvier Mvogo from the Department of Civil Protection of the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation told IPS: “The disaster management committee simply alerted the victims to prepare their minds that they will be returning. No exact date can be given because work is still going on.”

Joseph Tesse’s extraction process involves the fermenting and boiling of the palm oil fruit in large steel drums. Once the oil is extracted, it is diluted and passed through a sieve and then boiled once more. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
LITTORAL REGION, Cameroon, Jul 4 2013 (IPS)

In Maleke village, western Cameroon, an oil palm tree is considered to be “black gold”. At least, that is what Joseph Tesse, the local processor of oil palm, tells IPS.

“Every household here has a parcel of land with oil palm trees,” Tesse says of the residents in his village in Cameroon’s Littoral Region. The tree, which is indigenous to West Africa, bears a fruit that can be processed to make palm oil, an essential ingredient used for cooking here. Palms are also used to produce wine and liquor.

But while Cameroon may be the third-largest producer of palm oil, after Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire, it has an annual deficit of the oil  for domestic consumption. More than 80 percent of the palm oil produced here by agro-industries is exported to Nigeria, the Middle East, France and other European countries, Pierre Jonathan Ngom, national coordinator of Small Holder Oil Palm Development Programme Cameroon (SOPDP) tells IPS.

According to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MINADER), Cameroon produces about 200,000 tonnes of crude palm oil annually. Agro-industrial palm production accounts for 140,000 tonnes, while small-scale farmers produce the remainder.

“Supply for local consumption keeps falling as much of the oil produced is consumed by the processing industries and export markets. Following this trend, locally-produced palm oil has become a niche item on local markets,” Ngom says.

“The cultivation of oil palm trees is less expensive as compared to other cash crops. The use of pesticides is fairly limited and oil palm trees gives the highest yield of oil per unit area compared to other crops like soy,” Ngom says.

Smallholder farmers are rising to the challenge of meeting the country’s shortfall of local supply of this commodity.

“Oil palm trees are most resistant to drought and climate change and require little or no fertiliser or chemicals and need less care as compared to cocoa and coffee,” Deborah Mokwe a farmer from Maleke village tells IPS. She is among 200 individual oil palm tree farmers in the village.

Gladys Njeni is another. “A litre of palm oil now sells for 1.90 dollars on local markets as compared to 90 cents in early 2000,” Njeni says of the lucrative local market for the product.

Njeni is a customer at Tesse’s artisanal mill and she has brought her harvested fruit to be processed. “When I bring one tonne of ripe bunches of fruit (for processing) it produces 200 litres of palm oil, which I can sell to retailers for 180 dollars a tonne,” Njeni says.

But the extraction process at Tesse’s informal oil press mill is a slow and laborious one – even though he employs nine people to assist him.

“The work is very cumbersome, so men do the more difficult phase of the work while women do the selection of fruits and decide the form in which the produce is to be traded,” he says.

Tesse’s extraction process involves the fermenting and boiling of the fruit in large steel drums. Once the oil is extracted, it is diluted and passed through a sieve and then boiled once more.

“Artisanal production is not a sustainable way of processing palm oil. It entails a lot of waste in the quantity and quality of the oil – about 25 to 40 percent. A by-product is palm press fibre which cannot be extracted,” Alain Nkonji, an agricultural engineer with Societé Camerounais du Palm, a company involved in the production of palm oils, tells IPS.

But farmers here use this waste to fertilise their crops.

“In the 1990s, I used chemical fertiliser on my farm because it was cheap. Just before 2000, a 60-kg-bag of fertiliser was 18 dollars, but today it is 48 dollars, so I use the palm press fibre as manure,” Njeni says.

According MINADER, small-scale producers in Cameroon generate yields of less than one tonne of palm oil per hectare. But in Indonesia and Malaysia, small-scale plantations achieve yields four times those of their Cameroonian counterparts.

One of SOPDP’s aims is to increase this output, through the distribution of improved species and loans. The programme aims to increase national palm oil production to 450,000 tonnes by 2020.

“We also plan to create three pilot processing plants in major palm-oil-producing localities where farmers can process their produce at a reduced cost and minimise waste,” Ngom says.

Children from one of the communities in Ocean Division, southern Cameroon, who lost much of their forestland after the government leased it to a logging company. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDÉ, Apr 25 2013 (IPS)

Bordered by a rubber plantation in the west, a forestry plantation in the east and a palm oil farm in the south, the 18 local communities that live in Ocean Division, southern Cameroon, have had an uphill struggle for the rights to their land. 

In 2008, the government leased much of their forestland, about 47,000 hectares, to international company United Forest Cameroon.

But only through a sustained campaign and involvement by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI), a global coalition of organisations working to encourage forestland tenure, the communities were given back some of their land by a February 2012 prime ministerial decree.

Biang Marcelin is the chief of Adjab, one of the villages in Ocean Division. He told IPS that despite the turnaround by the government, the land given back to the community was not sufficient.

“This land was given for use to all 18 villages of this region, which has a total population of about 7,000 people. We asked for 17,000 hectares, but got 13,922 hectares.” Because the communities could not prove ownership of all 47,000 hectares, they had negotiated for the return of 17,000 hectares.

But the story of these communities testifies to the precarious nature of local communities’ land rights in Africa.

“Africa is indeed in a pivotal historic moment regarding who owns the land and, by extension, who owns Africa,” Andy White, the coordinator of RRI, told IPS.

Studies carried out by RRI show that, compared to other continents, Africa lags far behind with regard to meeting the main conditions for securing community tenure rights.

Less than 12 percent of laws recognising community and indigenous peoples land rights in Africa are adequate.

Governments in Africa own and manage 97.9 percent of forestland compared to 36.1 percent government ownership in Latin America and 67.8 percent in Asia.

Since 2009, the RRI has been working in West and Central Africa to stop landgrabbing and land allocations that do not serve a genuine public interest.

The group has also attempted to urge governments to legally recognise the rights of the rural poor, and to push for more equitable models that give forest communities a number of rights, including access to and usage of forest resources.

But only 13 countries out of the 24 in the two regions have undertaken appreciable efforts towards land tenure reforms.

“Some 13 countries have developed statutory tenure instruments. These include tools to formally establish new community rights, and to secure or strengthen existing rights.

“Some have also created institutional arrangements to recognise and secure rights such as local land charters, communal land certificates, and joint state forest management resources,” White said.

In East Africa, countries like Tanzania and Uganda have demonstrated a strong commitment to improving governance and curbing corruption by recognising both customary laws and community land rights.

According to Felician Kilahama, Tanzanian chairperson of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization committee on Forestry: “In Tanzania, where wildlife and fishery resources are found on community land, a village land act, which empowers that village to own that land, is issued by the national commission of land.”

“The land title is given to the village, and the village government or council with 25 members is in charge of overseeing that all resources are for the village and must benefit them,” Kilahama told IPS.

Uganda has also registered similar successes, according to Eddie Nsamba, the executive director of Consult Surveyors and Planners Uganda, an environmental impact assessment firm.

“Land governance in Uganda has changed; the state invested land in the citizens of Uganda instead of investing in itself. The state has 10 percent ownership of the land. What the government does is play the regulatory and control role over the land,” Nsamba told IPS.

In 1998, Uganda recognised customary and traditional ownership of land. It is estimated that some 80 percent of land in the country is owned in this way.

But these are far from perfect models.

“Wherever the reforms took place in West and Central African countries since 2009, it didn’t cover a whole bundle of rights,” Michael Richards, a natural resource economist with NGO Forest Trends, told IPS.

“The reforms that took place usually cover what appears to be a weaker and mostly revocable set of rights (access, usage, management, and extraction rights) but not ownership rights.”

The challenges that African countries face are steep and progress is slow, Phil René Oyono, an independent expert on natural resources, told IPS.

“In Gabon for example, the new land laws passed in 2012 revise the structure of land tenure rights mainly to provide a more flexible regime for commercial transaction on the land,” he said.

While governance of forest resources in Africa is plagued by serious conflicting choices, the flow of foreign capital into the continent is ever tempting.

In Liberia, for example, the Community Rights Law of 2009 was lauded as a major innovation because it recognised customary ownership of land.

But in 2012, the government negotiated a large-scale land acquisition with Malaysian-run Sime Darby and Indonesian Golden Veroleum. The companies were given about 220,000 hectares each of land – a significant portion of the country’s land. It rendered locals’ rights moot before they were implemented, Alfred Lahai, director of Green Advocates Liberia, told IPS.

White said that government structures across West and Central Africa were now “in a bind and divided, with some ministries choosing to hand over natural resources to agribusinesses and mining, and others seeking to protect the rights of their citizens.”

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
DOUALA, Cameroon, Mar 19 2013 (IPS)

The fruit farmers in Njombe, a small town in the coastal Littoral Region of Cameroon, learned a life lesson about “making lemonade out of lemons” – or rather “dried fruit out of fruit” when their land was taken from them by the government and leased to an international farming company.

In 1998, 34 fruit farmers lost 70 hectares of their land to Plantation de Haut Penja (PHP), to which the Cameroonian government leased 4,500 hectares of land to grow bananas.

Ndomi Magareth, sows bean seeds on her small piece of land in Njombe. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
DOUALA, Cameroon, Mar 14 2013 (IPS)

The fruit farmers in Njombe, a small town in the coastal Littoral Region of Cameroon, learned a life lesson about “making lemonade out of lemons” – or rather “dried fruit out of fruit” when their land was taken from them by the government and leased to an international farming company.

In 1998, 34 fruit farmers lost 70 hectares of their land to Plantation de Haut Penja (PHP), a subsidiary of French company Compagnie Fruitiere, to which the Cameroonian government leased 4,500 hectares of land to grow bananas.

But in 2003, thanks to the assistance and loans from the local NGO the Network for the Fight against Hunger (RELUFA), the farmers were able to purchase farmland in Njombe. The NGO also assisted the farmers with loans to buy fertilisers and chemicals and organised them in a cooperative called the Common Initiative Group (CIG) Esperance.

Bika Sadi is one of the farmers who has been growing bananas, pineapples and papaya on his new land and selling it to the dried fruit manufacturing business that RELUFA set up in 2009.

“We supply our products at set prices to the dried fruit project. A kilogramme of fresh papaya is sold at less than 20 cents on the local market, but the project buys it at 31 cents. And a kilogramme of fresh banana and pineapple sell for 10 cents on the local market but the project buys them for 24 cents,” Sadi told IPS.

The initiative, called the Fair Fruit project, sells oven-dried pineapples, mangoes, bananas and papaya. But it was born out of failed attempts by the farmers to obtain compensation for the loss of their land.

The Fair Fruit project, sells oven-dried pineapples, mangoes, bananas and papaya. But it was born out of failed attempts by the farmers to obtain compensation for the loss of their land. Courtesy: Monde Kingsley Nfor

The farmers took PHP to the Wouri High Court in Douala in 2005, and after five court appearances over three years, the company and the farmers reached an out-of-court settlement in 2008. However, only 28,000 of the 120,000 dollars promised in the negotiations were paid to the farmers.

A year later, Fair Fruit was created. The dried fruit packaging is clear about the reasons for the business. The label reads: “Fair Fruit is grown by Cameroonian farmers who were forced off their land by a transnational company seeking to establish its vast plantations. The fruit is cultivated and harvested in a just and environmentally friendly manner and traded under fair terms”.

Daniel Mahatma, a local fruit farmer in Njombe, manages the project that employs 10 people to work in the small processing plant built by RELUFA.

“The workers in this plant earn 2.50 dollars a day for five hours of work, which is a modest income for a youth who has the rest of the day for other activities,” Mahatma told IPS.

The dried fruit is packaged and then distributed to supermarkets, hotels and airports.

“We also sell the product to potential buyers through trade fairs and agro-pastoral shows,” Michelle Danleu, Fair Fruit’s sales and marketing officer, told IPS.

The profits have been ploughed back into the project and will fund a second phase.

In a country where an increasing number of smallholders have been forced off their land, the expansion of the project could help many more farmers like the ones in Njombe.

“Fair Fruit … could also tell the story of other marginalised farmers all over Cameroon,” Jaff Bamenjo, the assistant coordinator for RELUFA, told IPS.

“We are concerned about the new wave of investments in land and the negative impact on local food production and rural communities’ access to land,” Bamenjo added.

According to a 2012 Food and Agricultural Organization report titled “Investment Policy Support, Foreign Agricultural Investment Profile Cameroon”, the general foreign direct investment inflow into Cameroon was less than 113 million dollars in the 1990s, but reached 337 million dollars in 2009.

While there are no official figures on foreign agricultural investment in Cameroon, the report notes that some 48 percent of Cameroon’s population depend on agriculture for a living.

Even the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development is concerned about the number of large agricultural plantations in the country that have pushed smallholders off their land.

“Large plantations have a negative effect not only on local food production and supply, but they also affect the social economy of the locality where they exist. Added to the fact that most local farmers are usually evicted from farm lands, the farmers in most cases are restricted from farming close to the boundaries of plantations for fear that they might steal from the plantation farms,” Collette Ekobo, the agriculture inspector of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, told IPS.

As an agriculture inspector, Ekobo evaluates the performance of agricultural services, rural productivity and development in the sector and has authority to represent the ministry’s views.

“The complaints from farmers (kicked off their land) have been overwhelming in the Littoral and Southwest Region of the country, where most plantations are located,” she said, adding that she was unable to provide figures for the number of farmers affected.

She said the country’s current land tenure system “does not protect the interests of the locals who have been using these lands since the time of their forefathers.”

The land tenure system in Cameroon makes it difficult for private individuals to acquire title deeds. The 1974 Ordinance No. 74/1 on land tenure stipulates that private land must be titled and registered. All remaining land is classified as national land, which includes most unoccupied land, unregistered land, communal land held under customary law, informal settlements and grazing land.

However, obtaining a land right certificate is a costly and long administrative procedure.

Samuel Nguiffo, from the Centre for Environment and Development, Cameroon, told IPS that as a result most villagers had no formal land titles to their customary agricultural land.

“Land agreements given to large companies do not respect customary land rights or informal land holdings. The laws and the institutions in place do not protect their interests,” he said.

An inter-ministerial committee from the Ministry of State Property and Land Tenure is currently revising the land tenure law, and a bill will be introduced in parliament. But civil society groups complain that the process has not been participatory.

Nguiffo added that there was an assumption that foreign investors created more jobs than local smallholders, but said it was not a proven fact.

“If communities are given support through access to land, capital and technical assistance you will see them create jobs and wealth and contribute to national development more sustainably than large companies,” he said.

Meanwhile, on Jan. 16, PHP finally agreed to pay out the remainder of the settlement to the Njombe farmers. The reasons for this are unclear, but it could have had something to do with the labels on the dried fruit.

“As a precondition for the company to pay this money, they said we must remove the message that is on Fair Fruit packages. The farmers have agreed to this condition,” Bamenjo said.

Nasako Besingi (l), the director of the local NGO Struggle to Economize the Future, has been arrested an intimidated by police because of his protests against a controversial palm oil planation development in Cameroon’s Korup National Park. Courtesy: Frank Bieleu/Oakland Institute.

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDE, Dec 20 2012 (IPS)

Protests against a controversial palm oil plantation in the Korup National Park, Africa’s oldest and richest rainforest in terms of floral and faunal diversity, in Mundemba, southwest Cameroon will continue despite the arrests and intimidation of local environmental campaigners.

Nasako Besingi, the director of the local NGO Struggle to Economize the Future, told IPS “we won’t stop until environmental justice is done.”

The New York-based agricultural company, Herakles Farms, has been accused of grabbing a piece of this central African nation’s national forest as it goes ahead with a 73,000-hectare palm oil plantation despite a lack of government authorisation – there are claims that the 99-year lease agreement with the government is illegal – and two court injunctions, and in the face of significant community opposition.

The contested land is a “biodiversity hotspot”, a critical area that connects five protected areas in the park, and the project will disrupt the protection and growth of important wildlife, the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) said in an environmental and social impact assessment in August.

A report issued in September by two Cameroonian NGOs, the Centre for Environment and Development and Réseau de Lutte contre la Faim, said “there are over 20 villages with ancestral lands inside the concession, and 31 villages within a distance of the periphery, and over 25,000 people will be affected by this. They depend on that land for small-scale food production, hunting, and non-timber forest products.”

About 46 percent of Cameroon’s 20 million people live in rural areas, but according to a USAID country profile on property rights here “only approximately three percent of rural land is registered, mostly in the names of owners of large commercial farms.” The country is ranked 131st of 169 countries on the 2010 United Nations Human Development Index, partially due to persistent poverty.

Besingi said that he and his colleagues have endured police suppression, arrests and intimidation. His latest arrest was on Nov. 14, when the country’s national military police stormed his office.

“We were told we were required for questioning at the police post, and were detained for a day without charge. But it was only following international and local pressure that we were released (on bail) under the condition that we must appear before the authorities whenever we are (asked),” he said.

Besingi explained that the palm oil plantation project was going ahead despite the lack of a formal government agreement, because Sustainable Oils Cameroon (SGSOC), a subsidiary of Herakles Farms, had the support of those in power.

“SGSOC enjoys support from some elites, the chief of Fabe village (which is on the project site) and some government representatives, including the police. They have been bought over with money and material things. These groups of people, including the government, are misleading the people,” he said.

Excerpts of the interview with IPS follow:

Q: What is your interest in this campaign against SGSOC/Herakles Farms?

A: We cannot just sit and allow a few individuals to ruin the lives of thousands. So we have to make our voices and those of the voiceless heard.

Giving so much forestland to a company that has no real development plan for the people is injustice against a people who cannot have access to one-third of the forestland. Many locals feel there are already too many protected zones in the (forest). This massive plantation will further restrict their access to land.

Q: Bruce Wrobel, CEO of Herakles Farms, said in September that the organisation was already employing more than 500 people, and has committed to hiring among the local villages. He said that once the plantation was fully operational, it would require approximately 8,000 employees. Is this not an opportunity for the people?

A: There is little evidence that large-scale plantations will effectively bring economic development to this area. Past experiences in the country show such promises … to be false. Instead, large plantations have resulted in massive environmental degradation, the destruction of livelihoods, and the transformation of small-scale farmers and indigenous populations into low-paid plantation workers.

The company claims that it will create 8,000 jobs. However, the plantation will economically displace approximately 25,000 people who depend on that land for small-scale food production, hunting, and non-timber forest products. Thus, the net impact on employment will actually be negative.

Q: What is the problem with land management issues in Cameroon?  

A: There are two fundamental problems in my opinion. Firstly, communities do not have legally-recognised land rights that secure their access to the vital natural resources that they depend on; and secondly, Cameroon is still to develop a national land-use plan which would, in principal, evaluate the needs of local communities before granting foreign investors access to land.

Q: What would you want SGSOC/Herakles Farms to do before operating?

A: We demand that SGSOC respect Cameroonian law and the rights of communities.

Unfortunately, SGSOC has repeatedly violated Cameroonian law. They have signed an illegal contract with the government, and have shown no respect to local communities who, on the majority, oppose the project.

Following the 1976 law governing the allocation of concessions on state lands in Cameroon, subsequent to signing the lease agreement, SGSOC was supposed to be given a presidential approval to start cultivation activities. But this was not given, so the project has been in violation of the law since 2010. Moreover, prior to its operations, an environmental and social impact assessment was not conducted.

Q: What is the opportunity cost for the SGSOC/Herakles project? 

A: The opportunity cost for this project is the loss of forest revenue through the payment of environmental services, ecotourism and REDD+ activities.

All these activities can generate more revenue for the state than SGSOC can. For example, the Cameroonian Food Sovereignty Coalition estimates that if the government were to require bread makers to use 20 percent of locally-produced flour, 96,000 farming jobs would be created using just 15,000 hectares of land.

This would generate 13 times more employment and significantly larger government revenue than the SGSOC project and would leave land for peasant agriculture, conservation, and the use of non-timber forest products.

Q: What next with your campaign against SGSOC/Herakles farms?

A: We won’t stop until environmental justice is done. We want a new agreement that takes into consideration the sustainable management of that forest and that gives the locals better access to land and alternative livelihoods. We are currently working with more than 20 community groups and international and local NGOs and using every possible channel, like IPS, to reach the international community.

Numfor Jude installs solar panels in the small agrarian village of Sabongari, in Cameroon’s North West Region. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
BAMENDA, Cameroon , Nov 8 2012 (IPS)

In the small farming village of Sabongari, in Cameroon’s North West Region, the need for kerosene to light bush lamps and petrol to run electric generators has been replaced by the need for something much cheaper and cleaner: sunshine.

In an open corner in the village of about 2,000 people, large sunlight-capturing solar panels stand tilted towards the sun. They form the mini-solar power plant that supplies the electricity grid here in this village that is some 700 kilometres from the country’s capital, Yaoundé. It is an unusual sight for rural Cameroon.

The grid supplies 30 homes, including the home of Ndzi Samuel, a local primary school teacher, three small shops and a local hotel with electricity 24 hours a day.

“My children can now read with good lights, and I am able to use a mobile telephone today with no problem although we also have very low network coverage,” Samuel told IPS.

Prior to the installation of the solar panels in 2011, this village relied on three electric generators owned by business people. It allowed the few people here with mobile phones to charge them, but the electric generators were unreliable and often short-circuited equipment.

“I lost three phones due to power surges from an electric generator. But with the solar panels I can easily charge my mobile phone and stay connected,” one villager told IPS.

While this west Central African nation may have the second-largest hydroelectric production potential in Sub-Saharan Africa – 103 Terrawatt hours per year at present – only 30 percent of that potential is being exploited, according to the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership (REEEP). And access to electricity in rural areas is low.

According to the World Bank, of the country’s estimated 20 million people, some 8.1 million live in rural areas and only 14 percent of those have access to electricity. It is a huge disparity compared to access in urban areas of 65 to 88 percent of the population.

The government has been encouraging the use of solar panels to generate electricity. In 2011 a law was passed declaring that those importing solar equipment would not have to pay Value Added Tax from the 2012 financial year.

“Solar power is a good opportunity for all in Africa. Africa’s position at the equator level makes this continent the sunniest in the world,” said Asanji Nelson, a renewable energy engineer at the Ministry of Mines, Energy and Water Resources (MINEE).

But reaching rural areas with this alternative power source is still a challenge because the costs of the solar panels still remain unaffordable to the rural poor who depend on subsistence farming for a livelihood. An overview of market prices shows that home panels ranges from 400 to 10,000 dollars.

“The final cost of a solar panel is still a major impediment to villagers as such; enterprises in Cameroon do not target the rural poor due to costs that cannot be borne by villagers,” Asanji told IPS.

According to figures from MINEE, there are more than 25 registered firms providing solar panels in Cameroon, but most of them target urban dwellers and businesses.

The Cameroon Solar Energy Company also provides sustainable energy to people, but mainly reaches an urban-based clientele who acquire solar panels as a backup in case of a general electricity blackout.

For the most part, they target other enterprises that use solar panels for business operations, the managing director Tebo Vincent told IPS.

Energie Cameroun is another solar firm based in Yaounde. They sell solar installations, and also install solar street lamps for rural communities.

“We are based in the city because we have better customers than we could possibly have in villages. But we also work in villages when customers hire us to install panels. However, our reliable customers are city dwellers,” Haman Sani, the commercial director of Energie Cameroun, told IPS.

“Rural communities need our products, but the cost involved in the whole chain is high; importation, taxes, transportation and installation are costs that determine the final value of our products. In order to cover those costs and to make a profit, we mostly deal with companies and missionaries who can readily afford it for community hospitals and schools,” Sani says

Renewable Energy Innovators(REI) was able to install the panels in Sabongari and 10 other rural villages thanks to international funding.

The mini-solar power plant in Sabongari powers the village’s electric grid. Courtesy: Monde Kingsley Nfor

Numfor Jude, the president and co-founder of REI, explained that Wireless Light & Powers, a Canadian organisation that works to improve the lives of people in rural communities, supports them by providing material and financial resources for REI to travel to rural villages and by importing the solar panels into the country.

“We go into distant communities introducing solar energy sources to villagers at virtually no cost,” Jude told IPS.

In Sabongari, the installation costs of the mini-solar power plant were minimal.

“The villagers are united by their common problem of lack of electricity. They showed interest in the project by contributing the money that covers the partial cost of installation. Each household contributed a sum of 25 dollars and businesses paid 100 dollars. A maintenance fee of one dollar each is expected from them monthly,” he said.

A local villager in Sabongari told IPS: “It is like being rescued from incessant darkness. We can charge our phones and make calls to other places at any time.”

Weriwu Godfred, the project director of a government solar street light scheme in Yaounde implemented five years ago, told IPS: “Solar equipment is still only for the rich and beyond the reach of the ordinary Cameroonian, despite the non-payment of VAT today.”

He worries about the fact that most communities have rural radios but audiences cannot power radio receivers. “It is even more sustainable to run rural and community radios with solar power that represents less risk to humans and appliances,” he said.

Meanwhile, Cameroonians are increasingly vocal about power shortages and blackouts, which have made energy an increasingly important political and economic issue.

Rising oil prices, increasing global energy consumption and concern for the environment have led to a renewed interest in renewable energy. Cameroon’s development objectives under the Vision 2035 programme envisage significant investments in the renewable energy sector.

Asanji said that: “Cameroon relies on approximately 30 aging diesel power stations as back-up facilities for its hydroelectric network, meaning our hydro source is not totally clean.”

Smallholder farmers around the Yaounde city centre are increasingly farming on urban wastewater sites. Credit: Monde Kingsley Nfor/IPS

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
YAOUNDÉ, Aug 30 2012 (IPS)

Cameroonian urban famer Juliana Numfor has six plots of land where she grows maize, cassava, sweet potatoes and leafy vegetables, including cabbages, wild okra and greens.

The soil in which her crops grow is moist and visibly marshy, and a stream of water runs near it. But if you take a closer look you will notice that the water is dark and smells unpleasant.

In fact it is wastewater, which comes from a student residential quarter in Yaoundé, popularly called “Cradat”, that is less than 400 metres away from her plots of land.

But it is precisely thanks to the wastewater that Numfor is farming on this public land.

She told IPS that she prefers planting her crops on urban wastewater sites because she can easily irrigate them by using the readily available wastewater. She said that this was because rainfall had become increasingly irregular – coming and going when she least expected.

“The kind of crops on this piece of land can grow on any fertile land if it is well watered. But during this period in August, which is supposed to be a very wet time of the year in Yaoundé, very little rainfall has fallen. It makes it impossible for vegetable crops to grow without proper irrigation,” Numfor said.

And Numfor is not the only farmer doing this. Smallholder farmers around the Yaoundé city centre are increasingly farming on urban wastewater sites.

While there are no official figures of how many people are farming in these areas, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MINADER) admitted that the practice was overwhelming.

Smallholder farmers in and around Yaoundé can be seen planting their crops on public land, along railways, in conservation areas, and even near roads.

“This is a long-time practice that has only intensified due to a lot of causes, climate change being one. Many farmers have resorted to urban farming with wastewater,” Collette Ekobo, an agricultural inspector at MINADER, told IPS.

One 45-year-old woman told IPS that she knew 11 other women who cultivated crops on land near wastewater.

“All I know is that the ground is very fertile. I think when people empty their sewers and other household waste into this water, it makes the land very fertile for farming. And there is water all season round,” she said.

Rural-urban migration, aggravated by the adverse effects of climate change on rural farming, is thought to be one of the main reasons behind the growing number of urban farmers in the city.

In 2011, MINADER began warning farmers about the climate variability affecting agriculture across the country. Yaoundé, which is located in Cameroon’s Centre Region, experienced reduced rainfall.

“Over the years in Yaoundé, the rainfall pattern has been so variable and not easy to understand. Rainfall has become very irregular, unpredictable and reduced … this leads to prolonged dryness and the drying up of streams, accompanied by exceedingly hot climatic conditions – all of which provoke poor agricultural performance and low output,” the ministry said.

Ekobo said that because of the changing climate, many farmers found it difficult to predict when to start planting.

“The month of March traditionally marks the start of the planting season in the Centre Region of Cameroon, following the start of the rains. But due to changing rainfall patterns, farmers have now readjusted their planting periods, a phenomenon which is rather difficult to grasp a perfect mastery of. It has caused a lot of confusion with the farmers,” she said.

She added that urban farming was integrated into the urban economic and ecological system of Cameroon.

“The land is rich with urban resources like organic waste, which is used as compost, and urban wastewater, which is used for irrigation. There are also direct links to urban consumers,” Eboko said.

But farming on urban wastewater sites is not a safe practice, according to Foongang Mathias, an agriculture expert at the Ministry of Environment, Nature Protection and Sustainable Development.

“Wastewater irrigation provides the necessary plant nutrients, especially nitrogen and phosphorous that are required by crops for ample growth. But farming in wastewater poses both health and environmental threats, not only to the urban agriculturalists, but also to the consumers of the crops grown on that field,” he said.

He told IPS that toxic waste from homes, hospitals and industries was probably deposited or carried into the wastewater.

“This water contains pathogenic organisms and disease vectors similar to those in human excreta. Pathogens that are brought in with the wastewater can survive in the soil or on the crop and are responsible for human diseases,” he said.

In addition, according to the World Health Organization: “Available evidence indicates that almost all excreted pathogens can survive in soil for a sufficient length of time to pose potential risks to farm workers.”

Despite the risks to her and her customers’ health, Numfor told IPS that the economic gains from farming in urban wastewater areas far outweighed the dangers.

She will continue to sell her produce to customers, who include restaurant owners and retailers. Numfor said that she earned an average of eight dollars a day, but sometimes made more when she sold her crop to women who export Cameroonian vegetables to the United States and Europe.

At a local market in Obili, a neigbourhood in Yaoundé, stallholders displayed large piles of vegetables that range in price from 200 CFA Francs (50 cents) to 300 CFA Francs (75 cents) per bunch. And consumers here did not care where the produce was grown.

“I totally ignore the fact that they are grown in wastewater because even if they contain germs, the organism cannot survive in the pot with very high temperature,” one woman, who bought three bundles of bitter leaf or Vernonia amygdalina, told IPS.

Another said she felt the vegetables were safe if cooked in hygienic conditions and besides, “no one has ever complained after consuming these vegetables.”

Meanwhile, Eboko said that the government did not plan to regulate farming near wastewater areas.

“Urban wastewater farming is not a regulated activity in Cameroon, although it is an important part of the urban food system. It is not yet considered as a potential problem, but is considered as a subsistence way of life for women.”