2.1 Much more detailed data is needed on the pilot studies already carried out on bush meat, charcoal and other forest products, as well as on anthropological perceptions. Concerning the socio-economic aspects of forest products in the urban context, actions to be taken include:
-inventorying volume at formal market areas and along informal commercial
networks;
-establishing their real costs compared with alternative products;
-elaborating an ethno-linguistic nomenclature of forest products
consumed in cities;
-identifying and making contact with the social actors participating
in the chain of exchange. This is important because forest-city relations
are strongly influenced by these actors who know how to decode the
economic messages relating to supply and demand;
-establishing the ethnicity of these social actors;
-establishing the ethnicity and socio-economic level of consumers
of forest products;
-investigating gender roles.
2.2 With respect to perceptions, more detailed anthropological analysis
is needed concerning:
-the forest space;
-conservation;
-ecology;
-the environment;
-wildlife;
-hinterland land tenure systems;
-forest peoples (hunters-gatherers, shifting cultivators, river people);
-professionals or semi-professionals whose livelihoods are linked
to forest exploitation (hunters, poachers, bush meat traders, those
working in the timber sector, etc.);
-human relationships between city dwellers and their forest-based
family;
-how city dwellers identify themselves vis-a-vis their forest origins;
-how they perceive the question of land use in surrounding forest
areas.
2.3 The geographical scope of research should be extended:
-to capitals or major cities in other countries where ECOFAC is active,
i.e. Bangui, Brazzaville, Bata;
-to provincial urban areas which lie deep in the tropical forest
such as Mbandaka, Bukavu or Kisangani (Zaire); Ouesso (Congo Brazzaville);
Makokou or Oyem (Gabon); Ebolowa (Cameroon); Nola (Central African
Republic).
2.4 Milieu focus should also be extended. As rivers and river peoples are intimately associated with the forest biome, use and perceptions of central Africa's great rivers e.g. the Ogooué, Sanaga, Sangha, Ubangui, Zaire, should be examined.
2.5 Investigations should be made into how small-scale forest-based industrial, agricultural or craft products can be commercialised in cities. Forest peoples are increasingly involved in the process of monetarisation so commercialisation of such products can stabilise these populations in their forest villages. This can contribute to the valorisation of the forest in the eyes of those who live there while diminishing migration into urban areas.1
2.6 Further study should be conducted concerning local acceptance of fuel efficient grills in those cities where charcoal is used extensively. They can be manufactured and distributed locally at relatively low prices. Use of such grills could diminish deforestation around cities and tree removal within the cities themselves. (Similar projects have been carried out in the drought-beset Sahel region.)
2.7 Alternatives to bush meat consumption in urban areas should be developed and attitudes tested. Avenues to explore include adapting conventional livestock breeding techniques to local conditions; game ranching, game cropping, game farming; or offering urban consumers raised meat which has been smoked according to local custom (see Section 7.1.2).
2.8 Public awareness and public relations structures should be put
in place, in central African cities, enabling local authorities to
stimulate interest and concern for the forest. Public awareness is
a large part of conservation yet school curriculum, or more importantly
the media has so far devoted insufficient attention to the debate.
2.9 Greater attention should be given to the elaboration of systems
models in the area of forest conservation. If forest conservation
is considered as a "system", then the various social science
research factors described below are "sub-systems" which
interact and influence the functioning of the "system".
The forest-city interface is likewise a system with dependent sub-systems
which could be understood more clearly through modelling techniques.
2.10 Before research on the forest-city interface can be meaningful
it must be centralised. It is consequently recommended that an operational
research support structure be formally constituted. It could be located
at the Centre of Cultural Anthropology at the Université Libre
de Bruxelles; a Centre which has already developed expertise in the
area of forest conservation research and the forest-city interface,
as well as having accumulated a specialised library on related matters.
One full-time researcher and one half-time documentalist will be needed
in Brussels. Either four half-time or two full-time researchers /
co-ordinators should be recruited in Yaoundé, Kinshasa and
Gabon (in a first phase). The research support structure in general
and these persons in particular (who have already been identified)
will work jointly to:
-collect, inventory, classify and house related documentation and
cartographic resources;
-co-ordinate pilot studies and research projects in central Africa;
-provide badly needed infrastructure to African partners in local
universities and research centres;
-maintain a data bank housing and sharing documentation and live
information on projects, researchers, NGOs and contracts (this data
bank should be connected to on-line physical information networks
which will facilitate communication between researchers in Europe
and the US and between Europe and Africa);
-work with local leaders in central Africa by making recommendations;
by participating in environmental public awareness and education campaigns;
by sharing information on conservation legislation and trends; by
supplying information on international funding possibilities for forest
conservation; by performing public relations and lobbying functions
on the international level. The public relations dimension is of primary
importance because while there is interest in forest conservation
on the local and international levels, more harmonisation and concerted
action is needed;
-work with the European Union by orchestrating or carrying out feasibility
studies and short- or long-term projects; by making recommendations;
by supporting other European Union forest-related projects such as
ECOFAC; by monitoring and evaluating conservation activities being
undertaken by national governments and other environmental groups.