Effects of participatory forest management on livelihood capitals of the community in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh

In Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, we surveyed 80 households to observe the effects of participatory forestry (PF) on the livelihood of local participants. We analyzed the effects on livelihood capitals to compare in two ways: (1) before and after participation, and (2) participants and non-participants. In Cox’s Bazar, there were some significant changes regarding income sources, but annual income was little changed after participation in participatory forestry. Literacy (about 10 % after participation) and mobile phone ownership (75 %) were significantly higher than before. Housing conditions were better (brick walls: 7.5 %; sun-grass roof: 70 %) than those of non-participants (brick walls: 0 %; sun-grass roof: 77.5 %). PF ensured legal rights on forest lands for participants, while non-participants were illegally living on public forestland. However, expenses were considerably higher than income; people were still struggling with poverty and many of them suffered from malnutrition. This ultimately put pressure on all capital. People had redistributed their available capital to cope with adversity, and there was a trend toward involvement in economic activities other than forests. Our study found that social capital was more influenced by PF more than other capitals. Due to the involvement with the PF program, people were feeling much more secure, women had elevated status, and social relationships became stronger.     

Forest Villagers in Northeastern Hill Forests of Bangladesh: Examining Their Livelihoods,Livelihood Strategies and Forest Conservation Linkages

Even though many forest villagers have been living on forest department land and serving the department in the northeastern hill forests region of Bangladesh since the early 1950s, their livelihood has not yet been fully explored. This paper examines the livelihoods of forest villagers (Khasia ethnic people) and their contribution to forest conservation, using data from the Sylhet forest division. The forest villagers are well-endowed with all the elements of a sustainable livelihoods framework, though human capital in terms of education is not satisfactory. Strong social capital, stable natural capital and a productive market-oriented agroforestry system facilitate the generation of financial and physical capital that make the livelihoods of Khasia people sustainable. At the same time, their reciprocal contributions in terms of forest protection and plantation development support forest conservation. However, some institutional issues such as insecure land tenure with regular agreement renewal problems need to be resolved for the sake of their livelihoods and forest conservation. Lessons learned from the study can be utilized in formulating future participatory forest management schemes in the country.     

The effect of participatory forest management on the livelihood and poverty of settlers in a rehabilitation program of degraded forest in Bangladesh

The sal forest is the only plainland forest in Bangladesh, and is of national economic and environmental importance. High population and ever increasing poverty has stimulated exploitation of the forest alarmingly and brought it near extinction. In facing this situation, the Bangladesh Forest Department implemented a participatory management approach, involving the householders living in and around the forests, for forest maintenance and protection. This study examines the effectiveness of practicing participatory forestry on the settlers’ livelihood in the encorached area of the sal forest. The settlers were given degraded and encroached forest land through the program. Two major social forestry models — namely agroforestry and woodlots — are included in the study. Participation in the resettlement increased household income, employment opportunities and financial and non-land assets. It was found that the participatory management regime could attain the sustainability of the forest and accelerate the standard of settlers’ livelihood, hence the program is an efficient management option towards sustainability of the forest resources. These findings suggest that there is a role for extending the approach to rehabilitate other degraded and encroached forest lands in Bangladesh.     

Community Forest Management in Thailand: Current Situation and Dynamics in the Context of Sustainable Development

Community forest management (CFM) has received increasing worldwide attention from governments, researchers and educational institutions over the past two decades. Many governments, especially in developing countries, have prioritized CFM over traditional forest management systems. In Thailand, CFM is not recognized by the legal system; however, there are de facto CFM practices under common property resource regimes. CFM has in essence been practiced here for hundreds of years by local people, and represents an important aspect of Thai culture. This study aims at evaluating CFM in Thailand in the context of sustainable development. To meet the objective, the study gathered information through focus group discussions with various stakeholders: academics, Forest Department staff, and members of the Chang Tok Tay community forests. From the study, it emerged that forest resources are critical for the livelihoods and survival of rural people, and so they have protected forests to ensure sustainable livelihoods. This study identified that prospects for sustainable CFM in Thailand are bright because: (i) community members are highly motivated and are sufficiently interested to protect trees because they are well aware that their livelihoods are under threat from depleting forests; (ii) tradition and culture of rural people support their relation with nature; (iii) non-timber forest products (NTFPs) play a crucial role in local livelihoods for subsistence and necessitate protection of the forest watershed, which is vital to support their occupations; (iv) spiritual rituals such as those where Buddhist monks bind yellow cloth on trees play a vital role in protecting trees, something rare in other countries. The study further identified various hindrances to achieve sustainable CFM: (i) legal support for CFM is absent; (ii) the Royal Forest Department (RFD) cannot transfer appropriate technology to community people due to lack of legal support; (iii) scope for developing effective strategies for sustainable CFM by combining traditional knowledge with existing scientific knowledge is limited; (iv) a formal institutional arrangement for CFM does not exist; and (v) community members’ access to the hard technology of CFM is limited. Therefore, in addition to legalizing CFM, a formal institutional framework for elaboration, implementation and control of CFM is essential to achieve sustainable CFM in Thailand.     

论干旱区森林可持续经营中的林牧关系

在森林中放牧是干旱区的传统,而且还会继续下去。但是,近几十年来的过度放牧已导致许多森林生态系统的退化,在发展中国家尤其如此。处理林牧矛盾的第一步是正确认识林牧关系,不能片面强调森林发展或牧业需要,而是要将其置于更广阔的社会、经济和文化背景中加以考察,必须兼顾所有各方的利益。否则,森林的保护与发展既无意义,也是不可能成功的。维持放牧强度与森林有限的恢复能力之间的平衡是一项长期的工作,需要不断完善政策法规、机构建设、公众参与方式、森林经营技术、以及资金投入机制,尤其需要注意的是,必须采取循序渐进的方式推行新的管理方式。加强科学研究,提高林牧交错区管理的科技含量,能够大大加速这一过程。     

Socio-economic significance of reed forests in a rural community: A case study from the greater Sylhet Region of Bangladesh

The reed forests that are the subject of this study are scattered over five thanas of the Sunamganj and Sylhet Districts of the Sylhet Division of Bangladesh. Their total area is 23,590 ha and they have great ecological, economic, commercial and socio-economic importance due to the diversified resources they supply. However, the forests are commonly encroached on by local people who are perceived to be seriously depleting the resource. This paper deals with the socio-economic status of the people residing near these reed forests, and examines their dependency on the resources provided by the reed forests. A socio-economic survey, participatory rural appraisal and interviews were used to obtain baseline data of the reed forest resource and the local communities. The study reveals that the communities in the study region have higher income than other areas of Bangladesh. Most survey respondents have other occupations in addition to farming. The literacy rate is 28.8%. Among the illiterate, 68% engage in collecting reeds. Although the Forest Department has a management plan for sustainable use of the reed forests, encroachers receive backing from political leaders and local elites, so their eviction is difficult. In order to achieve long-term productivity and sustainability from the reed forests, this study recommends a strategy of developing an integrated joint management plan between the Forest Department and the local people.     

Strategies for empowering the local people to participate in forest restoration

Within various parts of the tropics and temperate regions, there are increasingly more efforts towards reforestation or restoration. Interventions in the tropics however, have not adequately addressed the needs of local people compelling them to degrade forests. We conducted a study in and around Mabira Forest Reserve in Uganda with the aim of assessing locally proposed restoration techniques and conditions for empowering local people to raise their willingness to participate in forest restoration practices. We specifically set out to; (i) identify proposed techniques to restore the degraded forests, and (ii) determine the pre-conditions for supporting local people’s participation in restoration activities. Data were collected using individual semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions and participatory forest surveys. The findings show that the local people mainly engaged in practices that address their needs concurrently. The most reported practices include: planting trees on farm, enrichment tree planting in the forest, control of soil erosion, and control of invasive alien species. The main pre-conditions for their participation in forest restoration is assurance for more access to forest resources. The efficiency of local people in restoration will be enhanced by strengthening their capacity for collaborative forest management, raising their awareness on restoration, building their capacity, as well as continuous monitoring by forest managers.     

Ecological and anthropogenic niches of sal (Shorea robusta Gaertn. f.) forest and prospects for multiple-product forest management - a review

Sal (Shorea robusta Gaertn. f.) forests cover over 11 millionha in India, Nepal and Bangladesh, and these forests are conventionallymanaged for timber. Recently, interest in producing multipleproducts from sal forests has increased; accordingly, a silviculturalregime for managing sal forest for multiple products is a centralconcern. Forest managers need a comprehensive scientific understandingof natural stand development processes and anthropogenic factorsaffecting sal forest when designing silvicultural regimes formultiple-product management. We review ecology and productivityplus anthropogenic niches of sal forests. Information on edaphicfactors, phenology and stand development processes (regeneration,growth characteristics, soil nutrient requirement, growth allocation,nutrient cycling, stand structure and successional stages) isimportant for designing scientific forest management of salforest; likewise, knowledge of anthropogenic factors associatedwith use of sal forest is also required for effective implementationof the recently paradigmed management efforts. Sal forest silviculturehas been evolving since the beginning of the twentieth centurymainly concentrating on timber production, though the sal forestshave always been used also for grazing and collection of fodder,fuelwood, litter and many other products. Instead of integratingthese products in sal forest management, governments have attemptedto control these additional uses through enforcing forest legislation.These attempts resulted in the persistent conflicts betweenthe interests of local people and the government, and the deterioratingcondition of sal forests. Community-based forestry in this regionemerged in response to the severe degradation of forest resources,and local people initiated protection practices and demonstratedthe success of sal forest from coppice. The coppice systemsallow managing forests with intermittent products (non-timberforest products, including fodder and litter) while producingtimber in the long term. Accordingly, a policy has been developedto manage coppice sal forest for multiple products. Managingthe sal forest for multiple products is, however, a relativelyrecent development and scientific investigations on variousaspects of multiple-product forest management need to be initiated.Ecological processes indicate good prospects of managing salforest for multiple products. The review indicates that theecological processes and anthropogenic factors form sound basisfor developing multiple-product management.     

The role of NGOs in improving social forestry practice: Do they promote livelihood, sustainability and optimal land use in Bangladesh?

The encroachment rate in forests in Bangladesh is high and increasing — accelerated by rural poverty and the demand for dwelling space and forest products — causing environmental degradation as well as loss of forest cover and productivity. The forests are managed by the Forest Department, although a substantial area of marginal land belongs to other semi-public agencies including Roads and Highways and the Water Development Board. This marginal land has been left unused or underutilized. In contrast, nongovernmental organizations have an appropriate accessibility and technology disseminating ability to utilize this land in reducing poverty and enhancing rural livelihood, and have been highly active and successful in rehabilitating encroached forests. NGOs have added a new dimension to forest management, which has ensured community participation and protection of the forests, both planted and natural. This study evaluates the social forestry activities of four large NGOs, namely BRAC, Proshika, Caritas and CARE-Bangladesh, as well as national social forestry activities. By adopting a common partnership between public and private authority, property right conflicts have been resolved and rural livelihoods enhanced, and scope has been created for utilizing marginal land. The NGO partnership has been effective in reducing poverty and improving livelihoods. As an outcome of this common partnership, 33,472 km of roadside planting and 53,430 ha of reforestation activities have been carried out during the last two decades.     

Community Forestry in the State of Uttarakhand,India: Not Meeting the Needs of the Villagers

This community forestry case study examines village forest councils (van panchayat) in India’s northern state of Uttarakhand. We describe forest stocking levels of 20 community forests and address the question of whether these forests are in a position to provide commodity resources, such as fuelwood and fodder, on a sustainable basis. In addition, we report on the perceptions of the villagers on whether their respective community forest is meeting their fuelwood and fodder needs. At the biophysical level, none of the community forests were in a position to provide fuelwood and fodder on a sustainable basis. Most forests did not have adequate overstory stocking, and there was no evidence of deliberate management to improve the situation. Interviews with 400 villagers (20 in each village) supported the field findings. Villagers unanimously reported that their respective community forest was inadequate in supplying commodity needs. Furthermore, they wished the Forest Department would provide more technical and financial assistance to guide them with forest management needs. Women are a critical part of community forestry as they are the primary gatherers of fuelwood and fodder. Although the perceptions of women toward forest management issues are important, our interviews with female villagers indicate they play a passive role in decision-making. Decentralization in natural resources management sounds good at the theoretical level as it provides villagers with some authority and autonomy, but it cannot be effectively implemented without professional guidance coupled with resources. The villagers are ready and willing to improve the situation, but they do not have the resources to make change unilaterally—they need professional and financial support from the Forest Department.     

Social capital in small-scale forestry: A local case study in Southern Sweden

Small-scale forestry builds upon interactions among local stakeholders. Forest management entails multiple social situations such as consultations or cooperative engagements between owners and forest professionals. Successful social endeavours rest on positive social capital as operationalised via trust. Based on qualitative in-depth interviews with forest owners, managers and other forestry stakeholders, this study explores how trust influences the social relationships in a local context of Southern Swedish forestry. Most strikingly, the analysis reveals large differences in owners' trust towards two major actors: the Swedish Forest Agency (SFA) and the forest owner association (FOA) Södra. Permanence of personnel, a client-based approach, and personal features of SFA's local forest officer lead to strong local anchoring and high trust towards SFA. Södra proved to be a trustful partner in the aftermath of calamities; however its industrial priorities seem to erode owners' trust. The empirical findings of this study demonstrate the importance of recognising personal relationships and the catalysing role of bonding social capital in order to understand the local forest management situations. Our results are useful for forestry organisations and policy-makers willing to comprehend the local context and implement best practices in small-scale forestry.     

Deliberation or symbolic violence? The governance of community forestry in Nepal

The search for effective strategies to protect forests and improve livelihoods of the people dependent on them has led to several participatory approaches to governance over the past few decades globally. However, an important factor that hinders effective governance in most situations is the prevalence of complex interplay of power and knowledge among diverse groups of actors with unequal access to deliberative interactions related to governance. This means that improving governance must meet the challenges of modifying deep rooted, complex patterns of power that affect deliberative processes. Drawing on the concepts of deliberation (following Habermas) and symbolic violence (following Bourdieu), this paper explores the possibility and challenges of deliberative governance, taking the case of community forestry in Nepal. The central question this study seeks to address is how and to what extent various actors engage (or do not engage) in deliberative processes while enacting governance practices. It shows how a national forest governance programme is enacted as a complex economy of practices by a wide array of participants and analyses how certain groups continue to dominate the decision-making practices despite the growing rhetoric of participatory governance. Symbolic violence for our purpose occurs when claims to superior knowledge are used to legitimate closure in deliberation on forest governance practices and accepted by those excluded from effective deliberation. In the field of forest governance, we identify patterns of symbolic violence that limit the possibility of deliberation: creating boundaries in social field, cultivating internalised beliefs among governance actors, and sustaining unequal access to symbolic capital. The paper following Bourdieu, stipulates crisis as a necessary condition for the development of demands for increased deliberation by subordinated participants, and then explore sociological conditions for the development of crises into the situation of symbolic violence.     

Sustainable Forest Management in Tropical Rain Forests

Abstract

In planning of sustainable forest management, economic, environmental and social demands often conflict. Forest management in Southeast Asian tropical dipterocarp forests has been particularly biased towards maximizing immediate economic return from extensive logging. Overexploitation and other forms of uncontrolled land use within these forests have led to the situation where the remaining natural forests, most of them in Indonesia, will be liquidated within the next 10-15 years at the current rate of deforestation. In this paper we present an approach for sustainable forest management planning in which economic, environmental and social sustainability are considered simultaneously in order to define an optimal management strategy from a set of available alternatives.

We carried out a case study within a rain forest logging concession in Indonesian Borneo by using a participatory planning approach involving interviews of the local people, environmental assessment and economic analyses. We used the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method for resource allocation and priority setting in order to identify an optimal strategy which yields a sustained economic output from timber production, while at the same time being environmentally and socioculturally sustainable. Despite their relatively high costs, strategies involving selective harvesting combined to complete restoration of original dipterocarp stock in logged-over areas were superior in terms of economic, environmental and social sustainability. Priorities set by local communities for the strategies to meet their socioeconomic and cultural needs coincide well with those ensuring the restoration and biodiversity.     

People’s attitude and use of forestland: Co-evolution of forest administration in Bangladesh

This paper explores the influence over time of past policies on people’s attitudes towards the use of forestland in Bangladesh. The discourses of the attitudes of people were captured from the observed social tradition towards forest resources. Forests were reserved systematically and solely through the Forest Department. The conservation processes were not participatory, and rights and tenure were strictly controlled. People were socially excluded and alienated from the forest, and the socio-political factors stimulated negative attitudes among people. Forests were considered to be government property, and therefore managing forests was the responsibility of the government. People only used forest resources to meet their own requirements, either with formal permission or illegally. This situation continued even after the independence of Bangladesh in 1971. As a result, the forests of Bangladesh have been degraded heavily in recent decades.     

Certification of a Community-based Forest Enterprise for Improving Institutional Management and Household Income: A Case from Southeast Sulawesi,Indonesia

Forest certification for community-based forest management was designed to strengthen an area’s forestry functions while simultaneously alleviating poverty by developing the existing community forest. It is fundamental for forest certification to maintain the economic benefits for certified local sellers and balance conservation goals with increasing local incomes. This study explores how FSC certification of a community-based forest enterprise in Southeast Sulawesi in Indonesia could improve effectively field situations of community forest management and strengthen local peoples’ financial benefits and social perceptions towards conserving forests. FSC group certification was introduced in the area of teak community forest of several villages in 2005. Because of local strong interest in group certification, the size of certified forests, the number of group certification members and the amount of certified wood harvested gradually increased. The support of a local NGO and an international NGO contributed towards successful establishment of group certification and establishment of a small-scale forestry enterprise producing certified wood in a sustainable manner. These NGOs played important roles in establishing strong relationships between producers and consumers, strengthening local forest management institutions, and promising social and economic benefits to the local people.     

Contribution of forests to the livelihood of the Chakma community in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh

Natural forests offer numerous benefits to indigenous communities and society at large. Incomes from forest sources play an important role in rural households. In addition to this, environmental sources in the forests contribute significantly to rural households’ livelihoods and economic well-being. This paper examines the contributions of forests to the livelihoods of the Chakma tribe in Bangladesh. Using the data from 60 randomly sampled households from three villages, it measured forest-resource use with a monetary yardstick. As revealed through analyses, natural forest-sourced income occupies the second-largest share in total average household income next to shifting cultivation income in the study area. Forest products represent an important component in the local livelihoods, with a direct forest income of 11,256?tk?year^?1?household^?1 (tk = taka, the national currency of Bangladesh; US$1?=?tk70), or 11% of the total income, in addition to the households receiving monetary benefits of 18,951?tk?year^?1?household^?1, or 21% of the total income, through the consumption of forest products. The remaining income came from shifting cultivation practice. It was also observed that larger families with more people gathering forest products realized more forest income. This study will be relevant to forest and environmental policy-makers as well as indigenous community development practitioners.     

Competing Visions: Domestic Forests, Politics and Forest Policy in the Central Western Ghats of South India

Rural people in developing countries including India continue to access a number of types of ‘forests’ to meet specific needs such as fuelwood, fodder, food, non-timber forest produce and timber for both subsistence and income generation. While a plethora of terms exist to describe the types of forests that rural people use—such as farm forests, social forests, community forests and small-scale forests—the expression domestic forest has recently been proposed. Domestic forest is a term aimed at capturing the diversity of forests transformed and managed by rural communities and a way to introduce a new scientific domain that recognises that production and conservation can be reconciled and that local communities can be effective managers. This paper argues in the context of the central Western Ghats of south India that while the domestic forest concept is a useful umbrella term to capture the diversity of forests used by rural people, these domestic forests are often not autonomous local forests but sites of contestation between local actors and the state forest bureaucracy. Hence, a paradigm shift within the forest bureaucracy will only occur if the scientific forestry community questions its own normative views on forest management and sees forest policy as a means to recognise local claims and support existing practices of forest dependent communities.     

Unpacking the impacts of ‘participatory’ forestry policies: Evidence from Kenya

We evaluate the livelihoods of member and non-members of Community Forestry Associations under Kenya's participatory forest management (PFM) programme. We use propensity score matching of households based on recall based data from before implementation of PFM from 286 households and comparison of current incomes (2012), as well as review of records and interviews. Results reveal that members have higher total and forest-related incomes than non-members and indicate that impacts derive from labour and market opportunities supported by donor institutions, more than from differential access to forest products. In terms of governance the Kenya Forest Service largely remains in control of decision-making. Thus, PFM resembles Integrated Conservation and Development Project (ICDP) approaches. We conclude that current forest governance approaches in Kenya appear not to support participation in practice. Further, we conclude that impact evaluations must examine both outcomes and participatory forestry to provide meaningful policy evidence.     

Facing the Challenge of Social Forestry in Japan: The Case of Reviving Harmonious Coexistence Between Forest and People in Okayama Prefecture

Social forestry as a development strategy has evolved since the 1970s, especially in the tropics, to address forest degradation and promote local community development amidst the burgeoning population in these areas. As a practice, however, social forestry has been in place since ancient times in many parts of the world, including Japanese forest communities. Forest-people relationships in Japan drastically changed through massive afforestation programs after the energy source change and with the industrialization of the forest sector in 1950s. The majority of the planted forests are underutilized today and forest communities are marginalized due to the decline of forestry operations, depopulation, and changes in people’s values. Some communities address this concern by inviting potential urban migrants who may be interested in settling in rural areas. Using the case of the Nishiawakura Village in Okayama Prefecture, this paper explores the recent challenges confronting social forestry in Japan. It is found that underutilization of forest resources can be a cause of serious environmental degradation and marginalization of forest communities, and that Nishiawakura’s journey to renew forest management in partnership with migrants is a process of revisiting and creating the forest-people relationship. This study advances two related arguments, namely (1) the interaction of the local people and the migrants brings new perspectives to forest management, and (2) in a community facing depopulation and underutilization of forest resources, social forestry can be an effective approach to rediscover traditional forest management in a new form and revitalize forests and local communities.