Technical and institutional capacity in local organisations to manage decentralised forest resources in Uganda
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Date
2006
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Southern African Forestry Journal
Abstract
Uganda is one of the sub-Saharan African countries that has devolved the management of forest resources.
Meaningful devolution, however, requires that local governments and other community organisations
should have capacity in terms of adequate and competent human resources, finance, information, skills,
and the appropriate legal framework to effectively deliver services. This paper examines the technical and
institutional capacity in selected local organisations to manage decentralised forest resources in Uganda.
We found that technical and institutional capacity to implement decentralised forest governance exists in
local organisations through partnerships with other actors in the productive use of the available resources.
Local organisations mobilised and managed human, physical and financial resources for decentralised
forest management. They also demonstrated the capacity to make and implement integrated plans and
budgets and formulated byelaws regulating forest use. Our findings, however, revealed that none of the
organisations had either the legal mandate or sufficient human and physical resources to govern forest
resources unilaterally due to inadequate devolution of decision-making powers and inadequate fiscal
support from the central government. The findings suggest a need for local organisations to recruit more
technical staff, strengthen internal sources of revenue and networking amongst organisations both at local
and national government levels for effective management of decentralised forest resources.
Description
Keywords
Capacity, Decentralisation, Forest resources, Local organisations, Uganda
Citation
N. Turyahabwe , C.J. Geldenhuys , S. Watts & A.Y. Banana (2006) Technical and institutional capacity in local organisations to manage decentralised forest resources in Uganda, The Southern African Forestry Journal, 208:1, 63-78, DOI: 10.2989/10295920609505263