Causal importance of local contextual factors for collective forest resources management and control in northwestern Colombia

Abstract

Understand the effects of context-specific conditions on incentives, social interactions, and the likelihood of local organization is critical in supporting the sustainable management of collective tropical forests. In this vein, this study sought to analyze the causal relationships between factors in the context of the central rainforest of the Colombian Pacific that create barriers to local communities’ cooperation in commercial logging management and control. The Socio-ecological Systems Analysis Framework was used and fed with information from a literature review and 24 interviews conducted with key informants in the area. We found that the mechanisms formally established for administering and managing collective forests have failed to encourage user cooperation and have ineffective control of free access to the increasingly scarce forest resource. We were able to identify and explain the causal importance of seven local context variables concerning the generation of disincentives to cooperation. The variables were: forest area extent, representative mechanisms in place, formulation and relevance of resource use and management regulations, appropriation by local institutions, timber trade intermediaries, low socioeconomic development, and multilevel forest management hierarchies. The results of this study hope also to help identify more effective strategies to directly involve local communities and engage them in the management and control of collective tropical forests.