Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...

Chapter 6: Facilitating Change from the Inside in the Philippines • 167
called people’s organisations (POs). These are legally recognised entities
that are registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission or
Cooperative Development Authority. Because members are volunteers,
the POs do not represent the whole community or all forest users.
In exchange for the right to use the forest and its resources, the POs are
responsible for managing, protecting, rehabilitating and conserving the
forest, preparing management plans and developing their organisations
(DENR 1998); oversight lies with DENR. Having the mandate 6 to
supervise and control over the country’s forest and natural resources, this
national agency is in charge of the protection, utilisation and development
of forestland. It is expected to formulate, coordinate, implement and
monitor forest policies through its regional, provincial and communitylevel
offices.
DENR has made tremendous progress in devolving the management
rights over forestland to the communities. Of the targeted 9 million ha
of community forests to be achieved by year 2020, as stated in the DENR
Action Plan, by 2003 about 5.97 million ha had been granted to local
communities under various tenure arrangements. As of 2005, 1,781 CBFM
agreements had been issued covering about 1.622 million ha, and 1,781
people’s organisations were involved in these projects (FMB 2005).
Nevertheless, community forestry in the Philippines still faces many
problems. One of the biggest challenges is the lack of participation and
support from local government (Geollegue 2000; Tiongson 2000). The
authority to manage certain natural resources has devolved from DENR
to local government units, in particular the municipal and provincial
governments. The Local Government Code 7 authorises these units to
implement social forestry and reforestation programs, manage communal
forests of 5,000 ha or less, protect watersheds and enforce forest laws.
The code gives the municipal and provincial governments the authority
to implement community forestry within their jurisdictions. In reality,
however, DENR maintained control in various ways, such as by adjusting
its relations with other stakeholders, revising its rhetoric or imposing
excessive technical requirements on the local government (Gauld 2000;
Edmunds and Wollenberg 2001). The local governments also contributed
to this problem because they lacked the capacity and resources to engage
effectively in community forestry (Vitug 1996; Castro and Garcia 2002;
Ignacio and Woell 2002).