Explaining disparity in outcome from community-based natural resource management (CBNRM): a case study in Chilimo Forest, Ethiopia

Abstract

This paper examines the constraints on achieving positive social and environmental outcomes from community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) in Ethiopia, a rarely researched country. A comparative case study on successful and failed CBNRM in a pioneering and influential CBNRM project revealed the important determinant for disparity in outcome to be whether the existing collective decision-making arrangements on use rights and benefit-sharing support the members to whom those benefits are salient. Institutionalising CBNRM in government forest policy and improving the capacity to implement it are recommended to improve current conditions.