Lessons learned from community forestry and their relevance for REDD+

An assessment of community forestry in Africa compiled six key findings areas including empowerment of communities, governance and stakeholder engagement, benefits and incentives, capacity building, scaling up, and sustainability. Diving deeper into the key finding of “capacity building”, for example, the report notes that community forestry members have shown success in building capacity in skills, legitimacy, and social capital, which also include technical skills in “sustainable forest management, forest monitoring, forest tenure mapping, record keeping (including finances), and general skills, such as leadership, governance, communication, and planning”. One of the most important lessons learned was in the "empowerment of communities" where by simple and practical procedures and guidelines for legalization, proper management of community forestry, and inclusion of marginalized groups can make the greatest impact. The report notes, however, that in most African countries, the "delegation of rights to communities is incomplete, discretionary or limited in scope". (ClimateLinks.org abstract)