Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...
Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...
Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
Chapter 1: Introduction: People, Forests and the Need for Adaptation • 3<br />
to forest resources by forest users, market demands and the absence <strong>of</strong><br />
susta<strong>in</strong>able <strong>management</strong> practices, all <strong>of</strong> which had detrimental effects on<br />
<strong>forests</strong>.<br />
The move to <strong>in</strong>volve people <strong>in</strong> forestry activities began with the assumption<br />
that if rural people were part <strong>of</strong> the problem, then meet<strong>in</strong>g some <strong>of</strong> their<br />
needs for forest products and <strong>in</strong>volv<strong>in</strong>g them <strong>in</strong> forest <strong>management</strong> activities<br />
were part <strong>of</strong> the solution. As early as 1978, some <strong>of</strong> the ideas beh<strong>in</strong>d what<br />
was generically called <strong>community</strong> forestry were presented <strong>in</strong> Forestry for<br />
Local Community Development (FAO 1978). By this time, experiments <strong>in</strong><br />
‘<strong>community</strong> forestry’ were beg<strong>in</strong>n<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong> Nepal, and some other countries<br />
were experiment<strong>in</strong>g with the concept <strong>of</strong> ‘social forestry’.<br />
S<strong>in</strong>ce the 1970s, people-oriented approaches to forestry have emerged and<br />
matured <strong>in</strong> <strong>Asia</strong>, variously described as <strong>community</strong> forestry, <strong>community</strong>based<br />
forest <strong>management</strong>, social forestry and jo<strong>in</strong>t forest <strong>management</strong>.<br />
The <strong>in</strong>itial focus on <strong>in</strong>volv<strong>in</strong>g communities <strong>in</strong> government programmes<br />
for reforestation and forest protection has gradually evolved towards more<br />
devolution <strong>of</strong> decision-mak<strong>in</strong>g power (at least at the level <strong>of</strong> policy discourse<br />
and rhetoric, but less obviously <strong>in</strong> practice) and more active use <strong>of</strong> <strong>forests</strong><br />
by the local communities. From a relatively naive effort to ‘educate’ forestdependent<br />
peoples about the importance <strong>of</strong> trees and reorganise exist<strong>in</strong>g<br />
social arrangements for forestry activities, <strong>community</strong> forestry programmes<br />
have become much more sophisticated, focus<strong>in</strong>g on real decision-mak<strong>in</strong>g<br />
authority at the local level, changes <strong>in</strong> forest governance, and devolution<br />
<strong>of</strong> previously denied rights and responsibilities.<br />
Devolution <strong>of</strong> forest <strong>management</strong> is now a stated policy objective <strong>in</strong> many<br />
countries, but how much devolution has really occurred? A recent study<br />
<strong>in</strong> several countries shows that far from devolv<strong>in</strong>g <strong>management</strong> authority<br />
to the people who actually use and need the <strong>forests</strong> at the local level,<br />
devolution policies have sometimes actually decreased local control <strong>of</strong><br />
<strong>forests</strong> (Edmunds and Wollenberg 2003). For example, a case study <strong>of</strong><br />
Orissa found that exist<strong>in</strong>g local forest <strong>management</strong> systems were pushed<br />
to conform to rules under the state’s Jo<strong>in</strong>t Forest Management programme,<br />
reduc<strong>in</strong>g the decision-mak<strong>in</strong>g role <strong>of</strong> communities (Sar<strong>in</strong> et al. 2003).<br />
Whether this pattern holds generally is not certa<strong>in</strong>, although anecdotal<br />
and other evidence suggests that devolution has had limited effect (for<br />
overviews, see Fisher 1999; Fisher et al. 2000; Colfer and Capistrano 2005).<br />
Given that one rationale for devolution policies is that they will better meet<br />
local needs for forest products, especially those <strong>of</strong> poor and marg<strong>in</strong>alised