Forest Products, Livelihoods and Conservation

Chapter 1

Commercialisation of non-timber

forest products in Africa: history,

context and prospects

Terry C.H. Sunderland, Susan T. Harrison

and Ousseynou Ndoye

INTRODUCTION

Since the 1970s, non-timber forest products (NTFPs) have emerged to take

their place among the many aspects of forest use that guide natural resource

decision-makers. In the early 1990s, NTFPs were mooted as a potential

alternative to deforestation and land conversion activities (Falconer 1990;

Plotkin and Famolare 1992). Some NTFPs have strong market value and it was

postulated that the long-term value accruing from the harvest of these products

could override the short-term gain of converting that forest or individual trees

to other uses such as timber, agriculture, or plantations (Peters et al. 1989;

Godoy and Bawa 1993). The attention of both the conservation and the social

development communities was captured, and it was put forward that through

the harvest of NTFPs, the often marginalised forest peoples of the world might

capture valuable income and social benefits, whilst the aim of conserving of

natural forests was achieved. If this were indeed the case, then the

development and formalisation of the NTFP sector could at once meet the

often-contradictory goals of development and conservation.

This optimism, however, was based on exaggerated claims of economic

potential which were often over-simplistic assessments of ‘value’ (Southgate et

al. 1996) and a limited evaluation of the complexity of economic, social and

market oriented issues surrounding the NTFP category (Lawrence 2003). The

advocating of increased commercialisation of forest products for rural livelihoods

has also been questioned, and it is argued that many households barely cover

the opportunity costs of collection, even for high-value forest products (Southgate

et al. 1996) with the majority of the income accruing to those who transform

the product or local élites who control the market (Dove 1993).

Despite these concerns NTFPs can form an integral part in conservation and

development strategies (Ogle 1996), but this can only be undertaken with the

full knowledge of a range of interlinked issues and requiring a multidisciplinary

approach which incorporates social, economic, cultural, ecological and policy

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