Zambia's National Policy on Environment (draft May 2005)...still not ratified.

Zambia’s Forest Sector : Its Current State

• Widespread forest clearance and degradation.
• Forest degradation leading to reduced biodiversity.
• Failure of local assessment and implementation of forest laws to
prevent over harvesting.
• Unplanned clearance for farmland.
• Far too much uncontrolled annual burning.
• Destructive methods of harvesting.
• Unsustainable charcoal production requiring greater management
inputs and awareness raising.
• Fuel-wood demand increased and alternative energy not given
sufficient attention at all levels.
• As a consequence of inadequate forest management there is
widespread loss of productivity, erosion, siltation, reduction in
stream flow and other negative impacts verging in many places
upon desertification.
• Poor management of forest cover is probably contributing to
climate change.

Forestry and The National Policy on Environment

a) Objective
To manage the Nation's natural forest resources in a sustainable manner
to maximize benefit to the Nation and especially forest dependent
communities retaining their ecological integrity.
b) Guiding Principles
• Deforestation is a major factor in soil erosion, siltation of lakes,
rivers, dams and other water bodies, loss of biodiversity and
climate change.
• The involvement of the private sector, NGOs and local
communities in forestry is critical to improved management,
conservation and sustainable utilization.
• Promotion of private plantation and homestead forestry should be
encouraged.
• Community-based participation in the management of Forest
Reserves, Protected Forest Areas and forests on customary lands
shall be promoted.
• Local communities that participate in the management of
indigenous forest resources shall receive financial and other
benefits from their sustainable utilization.
• Inventorying and monitoring should be an integral part of
sustainable forestry management.
• Sustainable forest resource management and control of
deforestation should best be enhanced on the basis of appropriate
research, production forestry development and extension.
• Appropriate subsidiary legislation and regulations at the district
level are essential to effective implementation of forest policy.

c) Strategies
• Provide an enabling framework for promoting the participation of
local communities, NGOs and the private sector in forest
conservation and Joint Forest Management.
• Establish appropriate incentives that should promote the effective
contribution of Zambia's forest resources and on-farm trees to the
alleviation of poverty, sustainable economic development and
environmental protection.
• Provide economic incentives and the necessary legal framework
and technology to encourage and facilitate rural communities to
introduce alternative sources of energy to gradually reduce
reliance upon fuel wood and charcoal.
• Take direct measures to control charcoal production and organise
sustainable practices which include rehabilitation of seriously
degraded woodland.
• Promote development and dissemination of agro-forestry practices.
• Promote dissemination of indigenous knowledge about the
medicinal and other properties of Zambia's indigenous forest
resources and where possible assist in marketing such knowledge
for the benefit of the custodians of the knowledge.
• Introduce marketing and pricing policy reforms that provide
industrial fuel wood users with incentives to invest in tree planting
and woodland management.
• Ensure the sustainable utilization of forest resources by practicing
conservation in the use of forest products, improving specifically
the efficiency of fuel wood conservation, recycling paper through
incentives and regulations and substituting fuel wood with
alternatives such as paraffin, solar energy, biogas, electricity and
coal where feasible.
• Promote and support the conservation and protection of forest
ecosystems and the growing of trees by individuals, companies,
estates, local communities and authorities, including the integration
of forests and trees into farming systems, soil conservation
activities and land-use systems.
• Involve local communities in afforestation and rehabilitation of bare,
fragile or erosion-prone areas.
• Have particular regard to protection and rehabilitation of evergreen
riparian mushitu woodland, especially along upper river drainage
lines.
• Assist communities to set up appropriate management institutions
to control the use of forestry resources on customary land on a
sustainable basis.
• Promote forest conservation measures for civil works, including
minimal tree destruction when constructing roads, prohibiting
encroachment of protected areas.
• Provide alternative income generating activities that should reduce
pressure on forestry products such as the commercial use of Non-
timber Forest Products.
• Establish a forum where interested parties in forestry issues can
share ideas.
• Conduct well designed research programmes or adapt exogenous
technologies to local conditions in order to generate usable
technologies for the sustained management of planted and natural
forest resources.
• Revise and update the Forest Act in order to strengthen it in line
with the National Forestry Policy and to promote participatory
forest management and sustainable utilization of forest resources
having particular regard for private sector and participation of
women in all aspects of forest resource management.
• Continue the conservation and management of gazetted forestry
reserves and prohibit encroachment into Protected Forest Areas.