This paper described the experiences of an IUCN project trying to establish a 'forÍt villageoise', one of the first such attempts under the then Mali forest policy. The proposed village forest was a woodland on the flood plain of the Niger River, for which developing a long-term system of effective management would require the collaboration of diverse stakeholders. These included the traditional owners of the area - the Dioro ethnic group -, who were afraid of losing control, local fishermen, transhumant goat herders who were cutting fodder illegally, and an understaffed Forestry Department. The paper discusses the difficulties of essentially 'privatising the woodland, even if in the name of the community'.