CONFLICTS AND HARMONIES IN LAND USE IN THE KOGYAE STRICT NATURE RESERVE

ABSTRACT

This study was carried out in the Kogyare Strict Nature Reserve, an area

considered as ecologically fragile because of its strategic position between the

northern savanna and the tropical rainforest in the South. The objective was to

examine the conflict that has tended to affect the effective management of the

reserve as a Strict Nature Reserve. This was looked at within the framework of

socio-economic factors such as increasing population, claims of ownership and

the general methods of land acquisition and the influence of these in explaining

the incessant misuse of the reserve by inhabitants of the area.

The impact of this misuse, expressed in the degradation of the vegetation

was largely measured using the 1972/73 aerial photograph interpretation as a

base year for the determination of change in land use and cover of the area

using the 1991 Landsat T.M. image of the area. Wildlife was also made

reference to.

Three-hundred and sixty eight respondents were selected from seven

communities, four of which had been affected by the eastward extension of the

original Kujani Bush Forest Reserve in 1971. Opinion leaders, Odikros and

Wildlife Department officials stationed in these communities were also

interviewed for their opinions.

The logistic regression model was employed to identify and explain the

presence of the conflict on the basis of identified proximate variables.

The incidence of conflict was accounted for mostly by claims of ownership

over the area covered by 1971 eastward extension of the reserve and its

resultant difficulty in getting land for farming. Connected with this is the loss of

title to non-timber forest products (NTFP’S) such as wildlife even though these

resources are extensively exploited illegally.

Also, it was observed that ignorance of the laws governing the reserve

was not a major factor in explaining the misuse of the reserve resources. Rather,

this was dictated by the dire need for survival in the face of difficulties associated

with life in most deprived rural areas. The study revealed an extensive

destruction of the reminder of the forest reserve.

It also recommends the encouragement of reafforestation programmes in

the area, improvement in Community-Wildlife Department relations, increased

budgetary allocation to the Wildlife Department and a co-ordination of activities of

NGO’s working in the area with that of the Wildlife Department.