“This study was motivated by the fact that many communities that directly depend on natural resources have remained in abject poverty despite the increasing economic value of these resources. This is happening in key resources areas such as fisheries, wildlife-based tourism and forestry products. In the forestry sector, the prices of timber for example have increased three fold over the last decade. In spite of this trend, both the Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP) and the Environment and Natural Resources Sector Investment Plan (ENR SIP) present a case for increased budgetary allocations to the forestry sector in particular and other natural resources sub-sector in general. In this paper, it is argued that increased government and private sector investment in natural resources management is essential for the sustainable management of natural resources. This case study applied the Nature, Wealth and Power (NWP) analytical framework and the Commodity Chain Analysis (CCA) methodology to analyze
the current interactions among the stake-holders engaged in timber production and trade. The key influences that determine losers and winners from wealth generated in the timber business are examined. It is argued that the current structure for management and exploitation of key forest products such as timber is skewed in favour of the politically powerful stakeholders and those that have already accumulated wealth, hence leaving natural resource dependent
communities at the margins of the current economic boom.”
