Community Management

The Community Management of Natural Resources (MCRN) is an approach that seeks to implement, at the local level, negotiations and consensus between different interests and expectations within the framework of priorities, time horizons, conditions and concrete local situations, aiming at the common good as possible.

The MCRN’s assumption is the creation of income alternatives that offset the opportunity cost of conserving natural resources, which include the development of innovations in the use of wood resources of small commercial value and non-wood products; and the development of activities such as: beekeeping, handicraft, theater, sewing, carpentry, charcoal production from recycled paper, production of wood fuel following management plans, exploration of medicinal products of plant origin and animal, ecotourism with community tourist resorts, among others.

For communities to enjoy these economic benefits, they must be organized in Natural Resources Management Committees (CGRN). The CGRN is:

  • The most advanced and integrated form of representation and action of the local community within the scope of the management of natural resources and other community interests;
  • An elected body consisting solely of democratically elected community representatives, and operating within the physical geographic boundaries defined by the communities;

There is still no regulation that guides the composition and functioning of the CGRN, it is governed by the association statutes.

In addition to the CGRN, there are other forms of community representation such as Participatory Management Councils and Interest Groups, associations, cooperatives or community companies.

In the last five years the sector has carried out several activities with social, economic and environmental impacts, with emphasis on:

  • V MCRN Conference which had valuable recommendations with emphasis on: (i) assessing the power (Legal Statute) of the CGRN in forest areas, lacking the need to (ii) strengthen the capacities of the CGRN, (iii) rescue the role of the CGRN;
  • Organization and formalization of communities in CGRN;
  • Strengthening the capacities of the CGRNs, as well as disseminating the legal framework that guarantees the regulated use of forest heritage, for the benefit of local communities and CGRNs;
  • Channeling of more than 290 million meticais to more than 1000 communities living in areas where forestry was exploited.