Forest Products, Livelihoods and Conservation

Kathrin Schreckenberg 105

Policy environment

At the time the research was carried out in 1992/3 there was no direct

government intervention in the shea trade in Benin (Table 2). Until the year

before the study, shea kernels had been purchased by a government parastatal,

along with other cash crops such as cotton and cashew nuts, but the practice

was suspended as part of the structural adjustment process. Unlike in many

Sahelian countries, where there has been much external project investment

to promote shea butter as an income source for women, there was no external

support to any shea activities in the study area. The existing international

policies (Table 2) also appear to have little impact on the ground.

The Forest Department encourages

farmers to leave 25 to 40 trees

standing per hectare when clearing

new fields (Fagbémy and Sodeik

1993). Permits are required to fell

shea trees.

Government sets minimum price for

shea kernels each year in an attempt

to ensure a fair deal for sellers and

traders alike.

Production of CBEs is prohibited in

many European countries and the

United States, although the sale of

CBE products is permitted. In the

interests of product purity the

European Union has restricted the

proportion of CBEs in chocolate to

5% (Boffa 1999).

Impact

The regulation mirrors traditional

practice so has no particular impact.

Should traditional practice change, the

Forest Department would not have the

resources to enforce the regulation.

The set price is irrelevant at local level

as it is based on international prices

and does not reflect production levels.

Local market prices may be higher or

lower than the set price depending on

local yields.

There has been much debate within the

European Union about this issue, with

cocoa-producers concerned that

greater acceptance of CBEs will

damage their interests and the

chocolate industry arguing that the

impact on the cocoa trade would be

negligible. The fact that many of the

coastal West African countries export

both cocoa and shea complicates the

story but, largely speaking, they are

still more pro cocoa due to the

unreliable and unmanaged nature of

shea yields from year to year. The

practical impact in the field appears

to be minor. Shea prices continue to

shadow those of cocoa but at a

substantially lower level (Fintrac 1999).

Policy

National

International

Table 2. Impact of national and international policy interventions

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