Understanding forest based livelihood practices as a climate change mitigation and adaptation option in Vhembe Districts of South Africa

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1 Understanding forest based livelihood practices as a climate change mitigation and adaptation option in Vhembe Districts of South Africa Chidiebere Ofoegbu 1*, P. W. Chirwa 1, J. Francis 2 and F. D. Babalola 3 1 Forest Science Postgraduate Programme, University of Pretoria, 5-15 Plant Sciences Complex, Pretoria, South Africa 2 Institutes for Rural Development, University of Venda, Thohoyandou 0950, South Africa 3 Department Of Forest Resources Management,University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria *Tel: ofoegbu.c@gmail.com. ABSTRACT This study investigated forest based livelihood practices of rural households in Vhembe district of South Africa, with the view of understanding its likely consequences on forests resources management, and forest based climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies needed to address direct and indirect effects of climate change on people and livelihoods in the district. This was done by investigating households dependence on forest resource for income and subsistence, forest management capacity and meaningful participation in sustainable forest management. Vegetation type was used as criteria to select three municipalities; Makhado, Mutale and Thulamela out of the four municipalities in Vhembe district. Seven rural communities in each municipality were selected giving a total of 21 rural communities. A total of 366 households were sampled by means of a questionnaire. Findings show that household in the communities were highly dependent on forest resources such as firewood, thatch grass and wild fruits. In addition, there was high dependence on forest income especially in Thulamela (53%) followed by Mutale (38.4%) and Makhado (26.6%). Similarly, household meaningful participation in forest management was very poor in all the municipalities with between 82% and 95% across the municipalities not in any way involved in forest management activity in their communities. Additionally, household forest management capacity was found to be poor, particularly in Makhado and Mutale, where 45.4% and 36.5% of respondents respectively were found to have never attended any form of training on forest exploitation and forest resource management. It is therefore recommended that more practical approach towards meaningful participation of local people and authority in forest management through skill acquisition, entrepreneurship, and training on sustainable exploitation and use of forest products should be promoted. Keywords: Participatory forest management, rural community, natural forest, climate change INTRODUCTION Natural forests in South Africa are highly fragmented, and are the smallest biome of the seven biomes in the country. Nevertheless, natural forests have the highest diversity of plant species per unit area among the seven biomes in the county, and are a significant stock of terrestrial carbon (von Maltitz et al., 2003; DAFF, 2010; William et al., 2012). Many of the natural forests in South Africa are found in the poor rural areas with varying forms of ownership where they greatly contribute to the livelihoods

2 and culture of the communities (Berliner, 2005; von Maltitz et al., 2003). At the same time, the strategic role of forest resources in improving the welfare of rural household s within the context of the emerging climate change challenge has come into new focus (Das and Sarker, 2008). Several studies have documented the coping and adaptation benefits of forest resources to rural communities in times of climate variability and extreme weather events such as floods, droughts etc. (Somorin, 2010; Turpie and Visser, 2013) Forests are an important component of adaptation and mitigation strategies needed to address direct and indirect effects of climate change on people and livelihoods. Forest base adaption and mitigation actions are effective for rehabilitation of degraded land, maintenance of soil water quality, reducing deforestation, and reversing the loss of forest cover. Forest base adaptation and mitigation strategies not only have potential for protecting households and livelihoods from some of the harmful effects of climate change, but also provide opportunities for sustainable rural development and poverty alleviation through income generation and employment opportunities (Patosaari, 2007). Sustainable forest management is thus a critical component of any policy and action programme aimed at addressing the emerging impact of climate change on rural households and livelihoods (Patosaari, 2007). However, attainment of sustainable use and management of forest resources in rural community setting requires an understanding of household dependence and use of forest resources and their capacity to engage in participatory forest management. As observed by Cardona (2005), when forest regulation and management practices do not fit local realities, illegal activities tends to increase which leads to unsustainable forest management. However, in practice, South Africa s political instrument and legal commitments to participatory management of natural forest resources are not matched by the practice on the ground (Berliner, 2005). Consequently, considerable unregulated exploitation is occurring in many natural forests in the country particularly in those at the periphery of rural settlements (Matose, 2008). Several studies have investigated reason for failure of participatory approach in management of natural forests in South Africa. Von Maltitz et al (2003) and Matose (2008) reported that the state does not have the capacity to adequately manage all of its natural forests. They cited lack of capacity, experience and innovation on the part of grassroots officials as underlying causes. Similarly, Holmes-Watts and Watts (2008) reported that participatory processes in natural forest management in South Africa excessively focused on benefit sharing through employment, while ignoring sharing of management responsibilities, and decision-making. Nevertheless, knowledge of rural household capacity and training need is required to promote household s meaningful participation in forest management. This study was therefore designed to fill this gap. The main objective of this study was to assess household s dependence on forest resources and capacity to meaningfully participate in sustainable forest management. Specifically, the study aimed to: asses household reliance on formal and informal

3 forest sector; identify factors that dictate households dependence on forest resources; households capacity to participate in forest management; and how these link to sustainable forest management and reduction of households vulnerability to climate change. The term natural forest as used in this study follows the definition used in the South Africa national forest act and includes thickets and woodlands. To analyse the study aim and objective, we focus on the following research questions: Research Question i. How do forests contribute to households sustenance and income, and influence her livelihood ii. resilience to climate hazard? Do the communities have the desire, opportunity, community leadership structure, and capacity to engage in participatory forest management? METHODOLOGY Description of study areas The study was conducted in Vhembe District municipality, which is situated in the north of Limpopo province, South Africa. The district extends over km 2, and is bordered in the east by the Kruger National Park. The district shares international borders with Zimbabwe and Botswana in the north and north-west respectively (Mpandeli, 2014). The district settlement pattern is largely rural, reaching 90% of the total population, with women in the majority as well as people under 20 years of age (CGTA, 2012). Figure 1: Biomes of Vhembe district

4 Questionnaire survey and Sampling procedure Three local municipalities; Makhado, Mutale, and Thulamela out of the four local municipalities in Vhembe district were purposely selected to represent the different vegetation and biomes in the district. In each of the selected municipality, we further selected a replicate of seven rural communities, which gave a combined total of 21 rural communities. A grand total of 366 households were then selected from these communities using stratified proportionate random sampling procedure. For questionnaire administration, each selected household were subjected to a non-probability purposive sampling technique whereby we selected a respondent from the household that (a) were over 20 years of age and (b) have lived more than five years in the community. Questions were designed to tap into respondents knowledge and experience of forest regulation and management in the community, measure household s dependence on forests resources and its contribution to household livelihood resilience, and also to measure community leadership structure and its capacity to mobilise the people s for participatory forest management. In this study participation was perceived in line with Kalim et al (2013), i.e. genuine involvement of local people in the planning, organization and decision-making process of forest management. Data Analysis Data from the questionnaire survey were entered into Microsoft excel spread sheet and subjected to weighting adjustment. The weighting adjustment technique was applied to correct for possible problem of either over- or under-representation of variables (Bethlehem, 2015). The sample was weighed against the actual population to arrive at weighted sample. The weighted data was then imported into Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). Discrete variables were summarised by the frequency of each code within the questionnaire and summary statistics computed for all numeric variables. Categorical data on the opinion of respondents were analysed based on individual responses. Descriptive statistics and chi-square test were used to analyse: opportunities for participatory involvement in forest management; and the peoples capacity to participate in forest management. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Household dependence on forests and forest income Despite the high abundance of forests including plantations in the area, formal forest sector was found to be a low provider of employment and income to households in the study area (table 1). All formal forest sectors surveyed makes less than 49% contribution to household income, except for in Thulamela, where sawmill sector makes up to 56%. This is in contrast to the finding of Chamberlain et al (2005) where the formal forest sector was reported to be a major provider of employment in the rural areas of South Africa. The study findings however, corresponds with the findings of Lewis et al (2003) where it was reported that the formal forest sector contribution to rural household are often

5 poor and incapable of lifting the people out of poverty. Low contribution of formal forest sector to household income in the study area could largely be attributed to low infrastructural developments in the area, poor development of formal forest sector in the area, and also an indicator that the potential contribution of the forest sector to household income and rural development is not been fully utilised. Table 1: Contribution of selected formal forest sectors to household s income Forest Sector Contribution rating Community Makhado Mutale Thulamela Tourism High 12.7% a 31.2% b 45.0% b Medium 0.6% a 2.8% a 4.0% a Low 4.5% a 1.8% a 2.0% a No contribution 82.2% a 64.2% b 49.0% b Sawmill High 15.9% a 33.9% b 50.0% b Medium 3.2% a 3.7% a 3.0% a Low 4.5% a 3.7% a 3.0% a No contribution 76.4% a 58.7% b 44.0% b Tree plantation High 26.3% a 38.2% a,b 53.5% b Medium 6.4% a 4.5% a 5.9% a Low 4.5% a 2.7% a 1.0% a No contribution 62.8% 54.5% 39.6% Furniture High 12.1% a 25.5% b 48.0% c Medium 3.8% a 2.7% a 3.0% a Low 2.5% a 1.8% a 1.0% a No contribution 81.5% a 70.0% a 48.0% b Each subscript letter denotes a subset of community categories whose column proportions do not differ significantly from each other at the.05 level. However contribution of the informal forest sector in terms of subsistence use, informal trade, and as coping mechanism for climate shock and other shocks e.g. crop failure was very high in the area. Households in the area also use various types of forest products for subsistence. Common forest products used for subsistence by households in the area include; firewood, forest fruits and food (e.g. guava), construction wood, charcoal, thatch grass, bush meat/edible insect (e.g. Mopani worms), weaving fibre, fodder, medicinal plants, honey and mushroom. This is consistent with the findings of DWAF (2005), Shackleton (2004), Vedeld et al (2004) where subsistence role of forest products in rural live and livelihood were highly rated. Firewood and construction wood are the most commonly traded forest product in the area and also the highest contributor to household income. This is in line with report of DWAF (2005) which reported widespread informal trade in forest products both within rural communities and in urban areas in South Africa. Use of forest product as a coping mechanism to direct and indirect impact of climate change related shocks in the study area is very high. Trade in NTFPs is often used by household as income diversification strategy in coping with drought, erratic rainfall, crop failure etc. More than 60% of respondents in Makhado and Thulamela, and 49% in Mutale rated their use of forest products as

6 coping mechanism when impacted by climate shocks such as drought and erratic rainfall to be very high. The relatively lower percentage recorded at Mutale can be largely attributed to current condition of most forest in the region. Mutale is in the semiarid region, and most forests there are in poor state with low productivity and thus more susceptible to climate shocks. Consequently the forests play lesser role in current household coping strategy. Forest management capacity and participation in forest management One way of improving forest based adaptation and mitigation strategy at the community level is to strengthen local capacity so that communities are able to adjust, and participate meaningfully in sustainable forest management. In this regard we examined household current level of participation in forest management, capacity to participate in forest management, and local leadership ability to mobilise people to participate in forest management. Current level of participation in forest management Level of participation in forest management was examined, by asking the respondents if they are in anyway involved in forest management in their community. Figure 2 showed that over 70% of all the communities are not in any way involved in forest management in their community. Figure 2: Participation in forest management Unless targeted approach is employed to actively improve rural households participation in forest management, participatory forest management aspiration of the South Africa forestry authority may not be achieved. This will inevitably have severe consequence for forest based climate change adaptation approaches and sustainable forest management. As acknowledged in the South Africa s white paper on sustainable forest development, participatory approach in forest management can be a successful strategy for achieving sustainable forest management in South Africa (DAFF, 2010). This approach will also be crucial to addressing rural concerns in promoting sustainable forest management in the area (Holmes-Watts and Watts, 2008).

7 Capacity to participate in sustainable forest management Academic qualification and skills of the community was examined in order to determine the people s capacity to participate meaningfully in forest management and forest business enterprise. Figure 3 shows education level of respondents in the community. Figure 3: Education level in the community Majority of respondents in Makhado (67%), Mutale (78%) and Thulamela (50%) did not have any formal educational training, which might hinder their ability to engage meaningfully in forest management. This finding is consistent with the findings of Mpandeli (2014) and CGTA (2012) where it was reported that close to 80% of residents in Vhembe are not educated. Poor level of formal training as observed in the study communities could be a significant limiting factor to the community capability to participate in forest management. This form of constraint was reported in South Africa s white paper on sustainable forest development to be a major obstacle to promotion of sustainable forest management and development in rural communities in South Africa (DAFF, 2010). Furthermore, possession of forest management and forest business related skills acquired through experiential learning and informal training was found to be low (table 2). Apart from farming skills which is generally high in the study communities, possession of other skills such as hunting, craftwork, etc. which may enhance participation of the people in forest enterprise was generally poor. This is also consistent with findings of CGTA (2012) where skills shortage was reported as a major limiting factor to development in Vhembe district Table 2: Forest management/forest business related skills Skills Response Community Makhado Mutale Thulamela

8 Hunting Yes 5.2% 2.7% 0.0% No 94.8% 97.3% 100.0% Farming Yes 63.6% 77.7% 41.0% No 36.4% 22.3% 59.0% Livestock keeping Yes 22.1% 80.4% 14.0% No 77.9% 19.6% 86.0% Craftwork Yes 14.9% 19.6% 24.0% No 85.1% 80.4% 76.0% Ability of community leadership structure to influence people s participation in forest management Recognizing that community leadership structures are essential for mobilizing the people to meaningfully participate in forest management, we examined the community level of satisfaction with their leadership structure by examining their satisfaction with opportunity to contribute to local decision making. Apart from Makhado where 51.3% of respondents are either satisfied or very satisfied with their leadership structure, satisfaction is generally low in Thulamela (47%) and Mutale (29.6% table 5). Table 5: Level of satisfaction with community leadership structure Statement Level of Satisfaction Community Makhado Mutale Thulamela Opportunity to contribute to local decision making Very Dissatisfied 14.1% a 53.7% b 14.0% a Dissatisfied 29.5% a 15.7% b 40.0% a Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied 3.8% a.9% a 1.0% a Satisfied 39.1% a 12.0% b 17.0% b Very Satisfied 12.2% a 17.6%a, b 27.0% b Each subscript letter denotes a subset of community categories whose column proportions do not differ significantly from each other at the.05 level. Given the low satisfaction with community leadership structure in the study communities particularly in Makhado and Thulamela, community leadership structure in the study communities on areas of displeasure to improve their appeal and strengthen their capability to effectively mobilise the people for meaningful participation in forest management. As trust in community leadership is crucial to acceptance of community lead forest management initiatives (Wongbusarakum and Loper, 2011). CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION Findings from this study show that forests and forest products play a significant role in livelihood, and coping strategy of rural household in Vhembe district. Forest use and management are inseparably linked to livelihood security and local forest based coping strategy. Thus a correlation between

9 climate change, forest resource use, and management can be established. However integration of community member in sustainable use and management of forests and forest product as a climate change intervention strategy is constrained by people s capacity and community leadership structure. The following recommendations are thus: 1. Establishment of projects that will take advantage of abundance of forest resources in the communities to improve contribution of formal forest sector to livelihoods; 2. Provision of technical assistance to community leadership to enhance their ability to mobilise the communities for meaningful participation in forest management, and foster forest development in South Africa. 3. A detail training needs assessment of the communities for development of strategy to improve the community capacity to meaningful participate in forest management. Acknowledgements We are grateful to South Africa s National Research Foundation (NRF) and University of Pretoria s SAFCOL postgraduate forestry programme for the sponsorship of this study. The views expressed in this information product are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of NRF, SAFCOL or FAO. References Bethlehem J Applied Survey Methods: A statistical perspective. Retrieved March 11, 2015, from Weighting adjustment: Berliner D Systematic conservation planning for the forest biome of South Africa: Approach, methods and results of the selection of priority forests for conservation action. Department of WaterAffairs and Forestry (DWAF).Pretoria, South Africa. Cardona WC Forest regulation flexibility, livelihoods, and community forest management in the northern Bolivian Amazon. In G. A. Mery, Forests in the global balance Changing paradigms (pp ). Vienna. IUFRO World Series volume 17. CGTA, Vhembe District Municipality Profile. Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs.Pretoria, South Africa Chamberlain D, Essop H, Hougaard C, Malherbe S, and Walker R Part I: The contribution, costs and development opportunities of the Forestry, Timber, Pulp and Paper industries in South Africa. Final report 29 June Genesis Analytics (Pty) Ltd. South Africa. DAFF, Policy Principles and Guidelines for Control of Development Affecting Natural Forests. Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF). Pretoria, South Africa. Das N, and Sarker D Study on Forest Dependent Households under a Household Model Framework. Munich Personal RePEc Archive: Working Paper No. 05. DWAF, Draft Key Issue Paper on Forestry and Poverty in South Africa. Department of Water Affairs and Forestry.Pretoria, South Africa

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