Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...

2 • Robert Fisher, Ravi Prabhu and Cynthia McDougall
is happening to human beings and our planet, in this first decade of the
twenty-first century.
In this book we take the position that in a world as complex as ours, buffeted
as it will be by shocks, surprises and uncertainty of all kinds, the best we can
do as managers or ‘stewards’ is to let go of the notion of control, fixed plans
and solutions. Instead, we need to take our cue from the natural world
and from communities such as those described in this book, and try to be
inclusively, intentionally and proactively adaptive. How best we might do
this is the question we ask ourselves throughout this book, as we examine
empirical evidence from case studies in Asia. We, the forest researchers and
forest communities involved, can offer insights on adaptation that can help
others interested in managing forests and improving the livelihoods of poor
people. We also believe there are lessons to be learnt for the stewardship of
the planet we inhabit.
How people became important in forest management
in Asia
In the second half of the nineteenth century, state-controlled forests in Asia
came under management by forest services staffed by scientifically trained
foresters. This approach was first evident in India, with the establishment
of the Indian Forest Service after the German botanist Dietrich Brandis
was invited by India’s colonial masters in 1860 to make the management
of Pegu’s rich teak forests more sustainable. It quickly spread to most other
Asian countries.
During the late 1960s and the 1970s, challenges to this approach arose in
some parts of Asia, as it became clear that state control had often been
ineffective and that forest cover was rapidly decreasing. It was commonly
thought that the main cause of deforestation in the so-called developing
countries was pressure from rural people, particularly resulting from a high
rate of population increase. Consequently, it was assumed, involving rural
people in forest management activities (defined as protection of forests and
plantation of new forests) would help reverse, or at least arrest, the decline.
We now know that the assumptions about causes were simplistic, as were
the proposed solutions. Pressure from rural people was only one of a host
of other factors, such as excessive commercial logging, lack of legal access