Social For the neighbours’ sake

XII Social For the neighbours’ sake The State not only compensates and moves the many people directly affected by building projects; it also helps them make the most of the economic impact. In the era of major projects, everybody is waiting to see how they the announced programmes will specifically benefit them. This special time mainly aims to give Cameroon modern infrastructure, make it attractive to foreign capital, improve the business climate and speed up growth, but the government also cares about the major projects’ economic and social impact on people. Certain schemes can have significant short-term effects, driving some residents out of their homes or creating new jobs or remunerative activities. For example, building heavy infrastructure such as dams, motorways and ports, or opening big mining projects, offer employment prospects in many industries (real estate, food, health, clothing, leisure, etc.) but a minimum of training is required.

The State has understood this and is trying to help the people involved. Most projects affecting the natural, living and working environment make the neighbouring populations’ interests a priority. Depending on the situation, they are prepared for a move, encouraged to invest expropriation indemnities to create new businesses or steered towards new occupations or training opportunities. This is especially true in areas where dams are built. And soon, a major industrial-port complex will gradually replace the coastal forest at Kribi. Local elected officials have become involved in the project, even protecting the population’s interests in decision-making bodies; Grégoire Mba Mba represents them on the steering committee. “We’re trying to make sure that people, especially those living on the coast, can find themselves back in their natural environment so that they don’t feel uprooted,” he says. “Instead of excavating an empty lot to re-house them, we’d rather give them two 3,000m2 plots of land opposite each other, one to build on, the other to grow food on, but the latter cannot be sold. The aim is to help the State carry out the project while ensuring that the economic spin-offs in terms of jobs and sub-contracting benefit neighbouring populations; socially, that’s important. But we can’t put everybody in the same place because several villages are involved.

Right now we’re looking for possible areas to relocate them. Three have already been listed.”

“Major aluminium and natural gas liquefaction industries, which create various jobs in related areas, will move to the industrial-port zone,” says Louis Paul Motaze, chairman of the steering committee for the port of Kribi. “The complex will generate over 20,000 direct jobs and as many indirect ones. A new city of nearly 100,000 people, equipped with adequate social infrastructure, will be born. A real development cluster will spring up around the project, laying the groundwork for wealth creation.”

EDUCATION, HEALTH, ROADS, POWER, FISHING…

The same logic holds in eastern Cameroon, where the Lom Pangar hydroelectric dam is being built. “The environmental and social management plan provides for many facilities, including schools, health centres, roads, the electrification of approximately 30 villages and bridges to open up and develop the area,” says Théodore Nsangou, CEO of the Electricity Development Corporation (EDC), which is running the project. “We also give farmers and fishermen considerable help. The dam will produce around five billion FCFA (€7.6 million) in energy resources a year, while fishing in the reservoir can net up to 20 billion (€30.5 million) a year. Our goal, then, is to promote fishing, especially by urging people around the dam to invest in that activity to avoid what we’ve seen at other dams, in particular at Lagdo, in the North, where it’s mostly foreigners who profit from fishing in the submerged areas. In compliance with the president’s directives, we want this opportunity to mainly benefit people in the East.” Specifically, in the first phase “two pilot landing stages will be set up in the areas of Bétaré Oya and Lom Pangar,” according to the environmental and social management plan. “Monitoring fish stocks and fishing activities during and after the dam’s construction by EDC will help us understand the reservoir’s impact and adjust fishing management throughout the dam’s life. For that purpose, studies on the opportunity of developing fisheries in the reservoir will serve to determine the activity’s investment needs when the time comes. An access control mechanism will be set up to monitor and oversee the activities of the fishermen’s community circulating in the reservoir.” Control of the “migration of outside fishermen through a registration system for boats, canoes and other craft circulating in the reservoir” is also planned to ensure that local people will benefit. The project will submerge some of the Lom Valley’s gold resources, but panning will continue upstream from the reservoir after it is filled. However, officials will have to reorganise the local mining industry and help retrain miners so that they can find new occupations.

More generally, as the president pointed out on an October visit to Douala, the economic capital, the policy of increasing the major development projects’ socioeconomic impact is not limited to neighbours. Incentive programmes have been set up for young heads of smalland medium-sized businesses as well as individual micro-entrepreneurs to help them make the most of the big works’ construction or operational activities that began this year. Some target youth in traditional sectors like agriculture, breeding, fishing and services to industry, but also, in accordance with the president’s wishes, innovative information and communication technologies. Mr. Biya has announced another special programme to foster the emergence of young talents in the provision of industrial services with the goal of creating 60,000 jobs.

By François BAMBOU