The Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Natural Resources, Rohey John Manjang, has informed lawmakers that the forestry department is working on implementing a participatory forest management scheme for communities to take ownership of their forests to avoid bush fire and other forest disasters.

Rohey John-Manjang, who made this disclosure recently at the National Assembly, reiterated that when people know that they are part of the ownership, they manage and protect it.

This, she added, is the reason why in most of the community forests, they have limited bush fires.

"Therefore, we encourage all the forest that are idle to be owned by a community so that they can manage it at that level."

She informed them that sometimes they have projects that complement government's efforts to equip the forests with resources "gradually we will try to provide and support efficient, sufficient and sustainable management of the forest cover," she declared.

The environment minister also alluded to the fact that budget constraints hinder the employment of more forest officers to protect the forests as forest is consuming more of the ministry's budget than any other department.

"Therefore, we currently cannot employ more forest officers in the regions."

Commenting on the ban placed on timber exports, Minister John-Manjang noted that since effecting the ban on the exportation of timber in July 2022, the Department of Forestry has not issued any license for the export of timber.

To that end, she affirmed that the ban placed on exportation of timber is still in force. "But it is important for all to note that importation of non-threatening species for timber and the local consumption is not banned."

She indicated that they know that there is domestic demand so they can always export timber that are outside the range of non-threatening species.