Due diligence exercise with community member
The Due Diligence process for the Bakingili and MBAAH Community Forests (CFs) have been conducted. It was done recently through a series of processes to finalise the reception of finances from the Dryad project.
According to the Dryad Coordinator at the Environment and Rural Development Foundation (ERuDeF), Sheron Endah, the Due-Diligence process entails a series of checks to ensure that any finances given with respect to the project, is used for the right purpose.
“The Due diligence process is meant to verify administrative and financial procedure of the CF. it assesses their organisational capacity and document check; so as to get an overview of previous activities of the CF. This will help to determine if the Dryad team is engaging with a well-structured, dynamic, and a properly managed community forest,” Sheron explained.
She added that during this process, a baseline survey is conducted to determine the challenges of the community, after which, performance indicators are determined as a means to measure impact and progress of Dryad’s intervention in the community.
With respect to the Bakingili CF, it was realised after the survey that; the Bakingili community suffers from poor farm to market roads, lacks a lab technician and some basic drugs and equipment, suffer from seasonal water shortages and deforestation. Meanwhile, the MBAAH community forest lacks basic health care, suffers from poor farm to market roads, lacks basic school facilitates like teachers, branches and didactic materials, lacks a community hall and also suffer from deforestation.
The problems highlighted will be resolved with proceeds from proposed enterprises for these communities.Both communities had positive remarks after the process. In the days ahead, the communities will be signing contracts with ICRAF to start the enterprises.
Meantime, the Dryad project is said to provide training, technical assistance and financial support, to sustainable Community Forestry Enterprises (CFEs). It also has as goal to enhance viable CFEs with sustainable livelihoods and environmental benefits through performance-based public finance and support mechanisms
By Henrietta Killang
