Secondary forests in Africa

Tropical secondary forests are those forests that have developed after clearance (usually by humans) of the original natural forest. Although not appearing as such in statistics, tropical secondary forests occur throughout the tropics, including Africa, and the area is extensive and increasing rapidly.

Tropical secondary forests are usually an integral part of local and regional land use and production systems and inhabited by communities who are usually poor in economic resources but possess a wealth of traditional knowledge and practical experience in using and managing these forests.

If properly managed and developed, this type of forest may provide valuable and numerous ecological and economic services and are important for rural development, biological conservation, restoring site productivity and relieving pressure on undisturbed forests, and hence are important in sustainable development.

Despite their extent, importance and potential for being managed, tropical secondary forests are nationally and internationally largely invisible in current forest statistics, policy and planning, as well as in forest research.

In particular, the situation of tropical secondary forests in Africa is less clear; their status and importance have hardly been explored and documented systematically. So far, management of secondary forests has not been given significant attention in most African countries with the result that secondary forests are not part of forest management systems. Nevertheless, in various countries of the continent, interest in secondary forests is emerging and valuable research and development has been initiated.

The workshop

It was against this background that from 9 to 13 December 2002 at the World Agroforestry Centre in Nairobi, Kenya, an international workshop, Tropical Secondary Forest Management in (Anglophone) Africa): realities and perspectives, was held. The workshop was organized by FAO, GTZ (Germany) and EC-LNV¹ (Netherlands) in collaboration with CIFOR and the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF).

Context

The workshop in Nairobi, focused on Anglophone African countries, was the first of two workshops to be held in Africa. In November 2003 the second workshop - for Francophone countries - will be held in Douala, Cameroon. The workshops in Africa are part of a sequence of similar regional workshops previously held, respectively, in June 1997 in Pucallpa, Peru, for Tropical America² and in April 2000 in Samarinda, Indonesia, for Tropical Asia³.

Altogether the four workshops may give a good picture of the situation and importance of the world's tropical secondary forests, the strategies and priorities to improve their sustainable management and the required international support for cooperation.