**6. Views of chiefs, magazias and assembly persons on admitted rights**

The key informant interview with chiefs partly confirms the responses from the household survey. Sixteen out of the 23 chiefs admitted to their communities having user-rights though sometimes with difficulties. The remaining seven chiefs (six from the Walewale district and one from Tamale district) indicated that their communities do not have any use- rights to the reserves. Similarly, 16 out of the 23 "magazias" (women leaders) interviewed admitted to their community members having rights to collect some firewood and some non-wood forest products for domestic purposes. It was revealed by the "magazias" that the rights of women differ from that of men. Whereas women usually fetch water from the streams in the reserves, gather vegetables and fruits and harvest firewood for domestic use, men are allowed to hunt, harvest termites (for fowls), poles, thatch, as well as harvest firewood for sale.

The responses from some household heads, chiefs and magazias who indicated their communities do not have user-rights to the reserves show they are ignorant of their rights. Their responses could be attributed to their exclusion from management decisions or due to lack of awareness of communities' rights by the forest guards who blatantly restrict communities' access to the reserves. This is manifested in the responses of some forest guards about their knowledge on communities' right to the reserves in the following paragraph.

When asked about the knowledge on user-rights of communities the following were some of the responses from the forest guards:

*"Community members do not have any rights to the reserves. Farmers only have right to apply for land to farm through the plantation programme" (Forest guard— Walewale district)*

*"There is no user-rights for communities apart from farming under the national plantation programme. They should go outside the reserve for whatever they want until such a time that it may be possible for us to allow them into the reserve for some resources" (Forest guard-Tamale district).*

The above responses from some forest guards point to the fact that administration of forest reserves in the study area is not participatory. To the extent that frontline staffs of FSD believe that fringe communities do not have any user-rights to forest reserves, shows FSD is still holding onto the "command and control" system of management as was reported by Husseini et al. [4]. Moreover, because some community members are unaware of their rights over the forest reserves, they have come to accept the denial of their rights as the norm and so they do not challenge the status quo. The likely result of this denial is illegal access of the forest resources by community members since there is no motivation for them to protect the forest reserves. A situation which downfalls one of the purposes of the revised

*Rights and Responsibilities: The Reality of Forest Fringe Communities in the Northern Region… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93550*

Forest and Wildlife policy (2012) as stated in its policy strategic direction Section 4.1 Subsection 4.1.2, clause f, which seeks to define forest and tree rights in all kinds of forests and ownership systems (2012, p. 28).

#### **6.1 Social responsibility agreement (SRA)**

protective attitude of forest guards in the Tamale district as compared to those in other districts. Tamale Metropolis is the most concentrated in terms of population density and also the most urbanized district in the region, it has the highest proportion (14.3%) of the economically active population in the Northern region [13]. As such there is a likely need for more land for development, hence the need for tight precautions against encroachment. This could be a good reason to make forest

**6. Views of chiefs, magazias and assembly persons on admitted rights**

The key informant interview with chiefs partly confirms the responses from the household survey. Sixteen out of the 23 chiefs admitted to their communities having user-rights though sometimes with difficulties. The remaining seven chiefs (six from the Walewale district and one from Tamale district) indicated that their communities do not have any use- rights to the reserves. Similarly, 16 out of the 23 "magazias" (women leaders) interviewed admitted to their community members having rights to collect some firewood and some non-wood forest products for domestic purposes. It was revealed by the "magazias" that the rights of women differ from that of men. Whereas women usually fetch water from the streams in the reserves, gather vegetables and fruits and harvest firewood for domestic use, men are allowed to hunt, harvest termites (for fowls), poles, thatch, as well as

The responses from some household heads, chiefs and magazias who indicated their communities do not have user-rights to the reserves show they are ignorant of their rights. Their responses could be attributed to their exclusion from management decisions or due to lack of awareness of communities' rights by the forest guards who blatantly restrict communities' access to the reserves. This is manifested in the responses of some forest guards about their knowledge on communities' right

When asked about the knowledge on user-rights of communities the following

*"Community members do not have any rights to the reserves. Farmers only have right to apply for land to farm through the plantation programme" (Forest guard—*

*"There is no user-rights for communities apart from farming under the national plantation programme. They should go outside the reserve for whatever they want until such a time that it may be possible for us to allow them into the reserve for*

The above responses from some forest guards point to the fact that administra-

tion of forest reserves in the study area is not participatory. To the extent that frontline staffs of FSD believe that fringe communities do not have any user-rights to forest reserves, shows FSD is still holding onto the "command and control" system of management as was reported by Husseini et al. [4]. Moreover, because some community members are unaware of their rights over the forest reserves, they have come to accept the denial of their rights as the norm and so they do not challenge the status quo. The likely result of this denial is illegal access of the forest resources by community members since there is no motivation for them to protect the forest reserves. A situation which downfalls one of the purposes of the revised

guards in the Metropolis over protective of the forest reserves.

*Environmental Issues and Sustainable Development*

harvest firewood for sale.

*Walewale district)*

**88**

to the reserves in the following paragraph.

were some of the responses from the forest guards:

*some resources" (Forest guard-Tamale district).*

A social responsibility agreement (SRA) may be defined as an agreement capable of being enforced in a court of law which imposes a duty on a timber contractor to provide certain acceptable social amenities to the communities whose forest the contractor operates to the tune of 5% of the annual royalties payable by the contractor. These agreements are ways of ensuring that all Timber Utilization Contract activities are done in a more socially responsible way that respect the rights of the land owners. It is usually attached as a schedule to the contract, which is legally binding. SRAs are negotiated by the FSD with the affected communities in advance of the contract being advertised ([25], p. 33).

When respondents were asked whether they enjoy social responsibility benefits from the reserves, 342 of them (representing 92.4%) admitted they do not benefit whilst 28 (7.6%) indicated they benefit. The reasons given by the 28 (7.6%) respondents, who answered in the affirmative, are that it is their social responsibility to protect the forest from intruders and fire outbreaks. Others think that their SRA is the benefits they get from the reserve like firewood, grazing fields, hunting and football pitches. Certainly, it is clear from the reasons given by the few (7.6%) who claim their communities enjoy SRA that, they do not understand the concept of SRA or the facility does not exist at all as indicated by the majority.

For the 342 (92.4%) who answered in the negative, some of them indicated that it was the first time they were hearing about SRA. Others said that the tree species in the Northern region are not attractive enough for exploitation due to the unfavorable climate, to warrant such social responsibility benefits. Obviously, the latter reason affirms the climate and vegetation of the region, ie. relatively dry with a single rainy season and Guinea savannah [14], which does not support the growth of tall timber tree species. Further, the interview with the forestry staff revealed that, forest reserves in the region were gazetted mainly for protective purposes and so little or negligible exploitation goes on in them. This result also agrees with Mashall [27] that the functions of forest reserves in the Northern territories were for the conservation of water supplies, shelterbelts, and prevention of erosion, shelterbelts and domestic supply of fuel wood, poles and possibly the production of a limited amount of sawn timber. This implies that production of commercial timber was from the unset not the main objective for forest reservation in the study area.

Similar to the views of household heads and the forestry staff, response chiefs, assembly persons and Magazias revealed that fringe communities do not enjoy any social responsibility benefits from the forest reserves. These responses were further confirmed by the head of operations of stool lands in the region, who revealed that due to the non-productive nature of forest reserves in the region, land owners do not receive any royalties or SRA from the reserves. According to him, most revenue from the skin lands in the region come from ground rents, compensation and annual rents. These are fees taken for use of land for farming, residential, commercial and other uses related to physical development. The head of operations of stool lands in the region believes that this situation derails the interest of the chiefs in the reserves.

His response confirms Oduro's [3] observation that the current forest and wildlife policy is silent on how to reward owners of forests, zoned for permanent protection. The author argues that although owners of production forests receive

royalties, those whose forests have been designated for permanent protection and for environmental benefits do not receive any. The lack of social responsibility benefits for fringe communities is a hindrance to their allegiance to any effort toward CFM. Among the reasons for community participation in CFM is to secure access to a given forest and use rights as well as create new sources of income for communities [6]. Therefore, the rights of fringe communities in Northern region have to be secured if their commitment in the collaborative management of forest reserves is to be guaranteed.
