TY  - EJOU
AU  - 
T1  - Challenges of Enforcement of Forestry Legislation in Taraba State, Nigeria
T2  - International Journal of Geography and Geology

PY  - 2017
VL  - 6
IS  - 3
SN  - 2305-7041

AB  - Forests are essential resources for human survival and well-being. 
Within developing countries, millions of extremely poor people depend on
 forest resources for their livelihoods and security. The forest 
resources of Taraba State has witnessed high timber and fuelwood 
exploitation, bush burning, expansion of farmlands and grazing 
activities. Despite the existence of forest legislation in the state, 
illegal logging and indiscriminate forest resource exploitation has 
continued to increase at alarming rate. This makes it imperative to 
reappraise the forestry legislation in the state and the challenges of 
effective enforcement of these legislations. Data were generated from 
secondary materials, personal observation and interviews with officials 
of the Department of Forestry. The study findings shows that with 
increase in population, people need to expand their settlements and 
require more lands to cultivate in order to meet increasing food 
requirement. This leads to encroachment into forestry reserve. Poor 
logistics and weak institutional framework hampers the capacity of the 
forestry officials to enforce forestry legislation. This has resulted in
 the depletion of Forest resources particularly timber and woody plant 
resources. Some of the problems includes lack of political will on the 
part of government, underfunding, lack of or dilapidated 
office/accommodation, inadequate manpower, lack of equipment, lack of 
capacity building, Government preference and emphasis on revenue 
generation as against biodiversity conservation, Conspiracy of forestry 
officers, village heads and chiefs with merchant timber loggers, lack of
 effective supervision, coordination and enforcement of forest 
legislations. The study recommends the need for the government to be 
more proactive on the issues of enforcement of forestry legislation.
KW  - Enforcement
KW  - Forestry
KW  - Forest reserve
KW  - Legislation and Taraba state.
DO  - 10.18488/journal.10/2017.6.3/10.3.48.57