HAS DECENTRALISED FOREST MANAGEMENT AFFECTED CHARCOAL PRODUCTION PRACTICES IN EASTERN SENEGAL?
By Maaike Snel and Johan Post In accordance with Senegal’s decentralisation policy, important forest management tasks, including the right to allocate charcoal production rights, have been transferred to rural councils. We have investigated the impact of these institutional reforms on charcoal production practices using the environmental entitlement framework developed by Leach et al. (1999). The study clearly showed that decentralisation has not been able to alter forest management practices at the local level, although official rights and responsibilities have changed. The problem of legitimacy The environmental entitlement approach of Leach et al. centres on the three concepts of endowments, entitlements and capabilities. Endowments refer to the rights and resources that social actors have, while entitlements are defined as ‘the alternative set of utilities derived from environmental goods and services over which social actors have legitimate effective command and which are instrume
