The Forestry Commission has allayed reports that villagers in Lupane are arrested each time they are caught harvesting firewood for domestic use.
Evans Gwenhere, the Forestry Commission Forester for Gwaai Forest said due to the high volumes of hardwood in the area, there were no cases of arrests of locals that were disturbing the organisation.
He said this while presenting on a topic on sustainable forestry management during a workshop on timber logging organised by the Centre for Natural Resource Governance (CNRG).
“There is too much dry wood in Lupane, and no one is really arrested for fetching it so that they could carry out some domestic chores,” he said.
Gwenhere said the arrests that the commission has made thus far are of outsiders who try to come and make a living by selling the resources outside the district.
He emphasised that the community must however follow regulations on timber harvesting which entails that matured timber must be 30 centimetres in diameter and 1.2 meters tall as minimum measurements so that all flora and fauna can co-exist with humans from the forestry natural resource.
Gwenhere also urged the government to discard the top-to-bottom approach in the management of forestry so that at any given time the concerns of communities are accommodated.
“The communities will feel alienated if approaches to the management of natural resources are always coming from the top. They will not feel that they have ownership entitlement to their heritage. Concerns from the communities and how best they feel the natural resources must be managed must be respected,” he said.