Browsing by Author "Banana, Abwoli Y."

Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
  • Assessing the impacts of decentralization on livelihood, biodiversity and ecological sustainability in Uganda: A preliminary analysis of the pilot SANREM/IFRI site
    Bahati, Joseph; Banana, Abwoli Y.; Gombya-Ssembajjwe, W. (Uganda: Uganda Forest Resources and Institutions Center (UFRIC), Makerere University, 2008)
    In this paper we seek to assess the implication of decentralization on livelihood, biodiversity and ecological sustainability in Uganda. We aim to explain the change in woody-cover distributions in the Mabira Forest Reserve in the patches around Nakalanga and Kirugu settlements located on the northwestern edge of the forest. The purpose of the investigation was to further the understanding of how resource regimes, governed through a particular, enduring sociopolitical structure (decentralization), affect local use and management decisions in forest biomes as smallholders further integrate into external markets. Forest product use, residents' occupation, food security, land, and food decisions are analyzed to assess the importance of the forest on community livelihoods. The expansion of sugarcane in the Mabira forest edge, the introduction of collaborative forest management, and forest governance are linked to the sustainability of the current property arrangements and production systems practiced. Uganda's historical forest policy insights are presented to aid in better understanding of institutional design for environmental governance in forest biomes that partly explain existing outcomes of not only local users (e.g., livelihood and flow of resources), but also stakeholders at national, regional, and global levels. Although decentralization is fully institutionalized as a governance strategy, there is yet limited impact of decentralization policy on the livelihood of residents at the local level.
  • Decentralized governance and ecological health: Why local institutions fail to moderate deforestation in Mpigi district of Uganda
    Banana, Abwoli Y.; Vogt, Nathan; Bahati, Joseph; Gombya-Ssembajjwe, W. (2007)
    Paper examining the effectiveness in managing forests of local institutions put in place during decentralization reforms of the mid-1990s in Mpigi District of Uganda.
  • Early detection of troical deforestation: An IFRI pilot study in Uganda
    Becker, C. D.; Banana, Abwoli Y. (The Foudation for Environmental Conservation, 1995)
    This International Forest Resources and Institutions (IFRI) pilot study explores the following idea: if ecological conditions between forest patches are the same, then major structural and biological differences between forest patches may be entirely the consequence of human rules and use patterns. This hypothesis is explored using two different forests in Uganda: the Namungo Forest and the Lwamunda Forest. The conclusion of this study is that the rules governing similar forests do make a difference in terms of the amount of degradation. The Lwamunda forest, which was subject to more "open access" problems than the Namungo Forest, was significantly more degraded. This finding proves the hypothesis that, when tracts of forests are similar, the rules we place on the forests will effect their rate of degradation.
  • Gender and forest conservation: Cases from East Africa and Latin America
    Mwangi, Esther; Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.; Sun, Y.; Banana, Abwoli Y.; Leon, R.; Merino, Leticia; Ongugo, Paul O. (2008)
    This presentation discusses a cross country study on gender in community forest management. Analyzing gender participation in Kenya, Uganda, Mexico and Bolivia, the research demonstrates that participation in community forestry user groups varies by geographic region. More specifically, the research shows how gender is related to access to forest resources and participation in forest governance.
  • Institutional arrangements for managing forest resources in Uganda following decentralization of the forest sector
    Banana, Abwoli Y. (Kampala, Uganda: Uganda Forestry Resources and Institutions Center (UFRIC), 2007)
    Policy brief describing the roles and responsibilities of various stakeholders in forestry following forest decentralization.
  • Integrating remote sensing data and rapid appraisals for land-cover change analyses in Uganda
    Vogt, Nathan; Bahati, Joseph; Unruh, Jon; Green, G.; Banana, Abwoli Y.; Gombya-Ssembajjwe, W.; Sweeney, Sean (John Wiley & Sons, 2006)
    This article presents methods for investigating mechanisms of land-cover change that combines remotely sensed data, archival data, and rapid appraisals. Presents a case where increasing human activity results in accumulation of woody biomass on edaphic grasslands of a forest-grassland mosaic, rather than the expansion of grasslands at the expense of forests as is currently understood in that area.
  • Property right regimes and sustainable forest management: Lessons from fourteen years of monitoring of forest resources in Uganda
    Namaalwa, J.; Banana, Abwoli Y.; Gombya-Ssembajjwe, W. (2009)
    In Sub-Saharan Africa, deforestation and forest degradation have been the major problems facing natural forest resource management. Lack of clearly defined and enforced property rights, leading to a de facto open access situation have been pointed out as the major causes. National governments have been urged to remedy the situation through tenure changes such as privatisation and decentralization. This paper is based on the UFRIC study in Uganda and aims at investigating as to whether well defined and enforced property rights are a necessary and/or sufficient condition for sustainable forest management. This is done using 28 UFRIC forest sites under either private or government governance arrangements. The analysis indicates that both the state and private owned forests experience high degradation and deforestation levels, however, with high variations across the continuum for each governance regime. The paper concludes that establishing appropriate forms of tenure to delineate boundaries and limit exploitation constitutes an important step toward achieving sustainability. However, we need to identify other factors/conditions to complement this step in achieving sustainability. It therefore adds to other studies which show that the theoretical and policy perspectives concerning appropriate property rights for resources requires recognition of the specific historical, socioeconomic, political, and ecological contexts.
  • Resource, recourse and decisions: Incentive structures in forest decentralization and governance in East Africa
    Banana, Abwoli Y.; Ongugo, Paul O.; Bahati, Joseph; Mwangi, Esther; Andersson, Krister P. (Nairobi, Kenya: Kenya Forestry Research Institute, 2008)
    This paper asks: what is it that gets decentralized in the forestry and natural resources sector? And is decentralization effective in meeting the goals of equity, sustainability and poverty reduction? Using two ecologically similar forests, Mabira forest in Uganda and Kakamega forest in Kenya, the authors finds some sharp differences in the institutional regimes for their management.
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    What should we really be asking? Aggregated vs. disaggregated responses to household livelihood questionnaires
    Jagger, Pamela; Luckert, Marty; Banana, Abwoli Y.; Bahati, Joseph (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University and Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR, 2008)
    Presentation comparing the Poverty & Environment method of collecting household-level data with the International Forest Resources & Institutions method, which was developed for the purposes of this project and which involves a one-time visit to a household. Focuses on surveys completed in Uganda.