Cameroon-Equatorial Guinea cross-border protected areas agreement imminent .

By Ngalame Elias

The process of Rio Campo- Ma’an protected area agreement between Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea has been revived..

The process to reach an agreement that was established some 10 years ago has now been reactivated at a working session that brought the two countries together  in Kribi October 3rd, 2024.

 According to  Africa Wildlife Foundation that organised the  session, preparation process to reach an agreement between the two countries  started son ten years ago  but  stagnated for lack of funds.

A concept note from African Wildlife Foundation, AWF that organised the working session, notes that both parties  relaunched the process for the creation of the Rio-Campo Ma’an bi-national transboundary complex for the management of the Campo Ma’an Protected Areas and the Rio-Campo Natural Reserve in Equatorial Guinea after fundings became available.

Organized by African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) with funding from GEF 7 project , the meeting was moderated by COMIFAC and presided over by the D.O of Ocean division in the South , Nouhou Bello and the D.O of Campo Rio from Equatorial Guinea, Domingo Mbomio Ngoma).

The re-launching of the agreement accordingly, comes on the heels of preparations  for the Conference of the Parties on Biodiversity (COP16) in Cali, Colombia.

The Kiribi  meeting the organisers say, was the third held for this purpose.  The first meeting was held in October 2010 in Bata, Equatorial Guinea,during which several advances were made, including the development of a draft cooperation protocol aimed at raising awareness among Equatorial Guinean authorities, both at the central level with the visit of the Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Forests and at the local level with a meeting with all administrative and municipal authorities of Río Campo.

 The second session of the committee was held in Kribi from June 24 to 27, 2013, with the financial and technical support of the Cameroonian and Equatorial Guinean administrations in charge of protected areas (MINFOF and INDEFOR-AP), RAPAC, GTZ, WWF and AWF.

An Ad Hoc Committee was then set up with the mission of preparing the draft cooperation protocol for the management of the bi-national cross-border complex of Río Campo-Ma’an.

“ In the meantime, regarding the signing process of the Rio Campo-Ma’an bilateral agreement, the parties have mobilized to make progress such as;

The Government of Equatorial Guinea had already authorizing the signing of the agreement, while in Cameroon, the document had been submitted to the Presidency of the Republic to seek authorization for signature by MINFOF,” the release from AWF stated.

 Considering that lot of time has passed since terms of the agreement was drafted, and some aspects needed to be updated according to the evolving context, the country projects and the regional GEF7 project, which are part of the dynamic of promoting and managing cross-border landscapes, and the two country projects Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon for the implementation of their activities thought it imperative to organize an update meeting.

 “ It is against this backdrop that the workshop in Kribi on October 3, 2024, was organized under the patronage of COMIFAC and saw the participation of representatives from the countries, technical and financial partners (WWF, IUCN, AWF), the regional GEF 7 IP project (UNEP), the managers of the two concerned protected areas, the national coordinators of COMIFAC.

According to Nchoutpouen Chouaibou, Deputy Executive Secretary and Technical Coordinator of the Central African Forests Commission (Comifac),

“ the future agreement between Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea falls within the framework of the implementation of axis 3 of the Convergence Plan on biodiversity, in particular the objectives relating to the creation of trans-boundary protected areas.”

 This  initiative once finalized, will join others that have already been set up in the sub-region, including: The Sangha tri-national (TNS) – Cameroon, CAR, Congo; The Dja-Odzala-Minkebe tri-national (TRIDOM) – Cameroon, Gabon, Congo; The Mayumba Conkouati bi-national (PTMC) – Congo, Gabon; The Lac Télé – Lac Tumba bi-national (LTLT) – Congo, DRC; The Sena Oura- Bouba Ndjida bi-national – Cameroon, Chad. The Mayombe between Angola, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, which Gabon had also just joined, the organisers said.

During the Kribi meeting,recommendations and observations from meetings held by technical actors from each country were examined, analyzed, and adopted based on their relevance.

Also some new orientations related to the updating and finalization of the agreement were defined by both parties, the draft document of the Campo-Ma’an – Rio-Campo bilateral agreement was updated considering new contextual elements and a joint roadmap developed for the continuation of the agreement finalization process.

The implementing partners say they are confident about the rest of the process to be compeleted in the future

“AWF will support the forestry and wildlife ministries in implementing the measures resulting from this agreement especially in terms of combating illegal harvesting of wildlife products, improving community livelihoods, developing ecotourism and research in this area  ,” says Lesly Akenji, Senior Landscape  Manager Afican Wildlife Foundation..

He adds that AWF has the role in ensuring that these trans-boundary agreements in preparation  are implemented in accordance with international standards.

Other stakeholders have appreciated the revival of the process leading to the agreement that has come just when Cameroon has put in place its new forestry law.

” The revival has come at the right time just when Cameroon has promulgated its new forestry law which  takes into account the needs of the local population,” says Claude Memvi Abessolo, Conservator of Campo Ma’an.