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Perceptions, accessibility, and participation in urban forests: Insights for urban forest justice from a sub-Saharan African city

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: Conceptual frameworks of ecosystem services justice have advanced considerably, yet empirical evidence on how recognitional, distributional, and procedural justice are shaped in local communities and for different social groups remains limited, particularly in sub-Saharan African cities. This study examined how residents of four socio-economically contrasting communities in Kumasi, Ghana, perceive, access, and use urban forests and how they engage in their management. Using participatory mapping and focus group discussions with 125 residents in twelve groups, we identified factors shaping each justice dimension in the studied communities. Access to urban forests was restricted in different ways: in the wealthier community, green spaces were largely private or subject to entrance fees, whereas in the densely built, low-income communities, publicly accessible trees were rare. Participants valued urban trees particularly for provisioning and regulating services, such as medicine, fuelwood, shade, and wind protection, which supported their livelihoods and everyday adaptation to environmental risks. Participation in urban forest management was mostly limited to sporadic tree-planting activities without influence on decision-making. Across communities, limited everyday mobility, time constraints, and safety concerns, reported particularly by women, appeared to restrict residents’ ability to benefit from available urban forests. The findings suggest that similar justice outcomes can arise from very different local conditions, and that the justice dimensions are closely interlinked: participation appeared to strengthen residents’ relationships with urban trees, while scarcity shaped which benefits they valued. Justice-oriented urban forestry may therefore require context-specific strategies rather than uniform greening targets, and closer collaboration with sectors such as urban planning and social policy.

Source: Trees Forests and People

DOI: 10.1016/j.tfp.2026.101551

Authors: Angela Beckmann-Wübbelt, Lucy Amissah, Somidh Saha

Institutions: Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Forestry Research Institute of Ghana

Language: English

Topic: Urban Green Space and Health

Subfield: Urban Studies

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Sustainable cities and communities, Reduced inequalities, Peace, justice, and strong institutions, Life on land

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $1,680