Stakeholders’ Perceptions on the Effects of Forest Offences on Sustainable Forest Management in Ogun State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study assesses stakeholders’ perceptions on forest offences and its effects on Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) in Ogun State, Nigeria with a view to stimulating the state government to accord forestry sector with appropriate political will and proper funding. Data for the exercise were obtained from a stratified random sampling of 70 respondents in four categories namely Egba, Yewa, Ijebu and Remo through structured questionnaire. The respondents include forestry officials, saw millers and timber contractors. The results indicated that 452 (36%) staff are available in the Ministry of Forestry, Ogun State which was far below the expected staff strength of 1252 (100%) for all the categories of the staff to sustainably manage all the forest reserves in the four divisions. The chi-square result (4.63, P < 0.05) showed that sustainability is significantly dependent on illegal felling rate. Chi-square (X²) result (0.4895, P>0.05) shows that sustainability does not significantly depend on the category of forest user alone. However, Chi-square result (28.78, P< 0.05) showed that felling of undersized trees, illegal felling, failure to produce log certificate and non-renewal of property hammer committed in the study area are significantly dependent on the category of forest users. Thirty two percent of the native respondents in the study area committed felling of undersized tree. On the contrary, 67% of the non-native respondents committed illegal felling. All the categories of forestry staff affirmed that irregular salary and lack of logistics have had adverse effect on delegation of authority and the protection of forest estate. Chi-square result (11.87, P<0.05) shows that protection duty is significantly dependent on the salary structure of the staff cadres. It is recommended that the managers of forest resources acting on behalf of the public goods and services must exhibit exemplary attributes in their professional conduct and the government should provide forestry officials with the necessary financial support and adequate logistics to enable them carry out their duties promptly and effectively.