Why Does Tenure Security Matter in Community Forestry? A Critical Reflection from Nepal

Abstract

Nepal’s community forestry (CF) programme, which has been in place for over four decades and has rich lessons to offer beyond the national border, is the largest tenure reform initiative in Nepal. Tenure security is one of the primary requirements to unlock the ecological and economic potential of CF through the conservation, management, and utilisation of forest resources. Despite some gaps and issues in policy and practice, positive outcomes of CF have so far been reported. In this paper, we analyse CF tenure reform policy and practice. We find that forest-managing communities have been enjoying access, use, management, and exclusion rights over forest resources. However, communities are not able to tap the economic potential of local forests, partly due to limited opportunities available for commercial harvesting of forest resources and forest-based enterprise development. There is still a lack of institutional capacity among forestry stakeholders to harness the potential offered by changing policy at national and international levels, primarily due to ambiguities in forest carbon ownership and unclear cost and benefit sharing arrangements among different levels of government and community forest user groups (CFUGs). Addressing such issues to secure forest tenure and thereby realise the full potential of forest resources, both ecologically and economically, could be an area of future intervention, particularly in the context of changing national development policies and international environmental initiatives.

Climate-Resilient Forest Management in Nepal

“…Then there's the model of community forestry which has been in existence in Nepal for four decades and more after the enactment of the National Forestry Plan in 1976. Currently, the number of community forests in Nepal exceeds 22,000, which managing a total area of about 22.37 million hectares involving almost 2.9 million households (Dahal et al 2017;DoF 2018). These community forests follow the Community Forest Development Guidelines (2014) which empowers the forest user groups to develop their own constitution and management plans, and directs them in implementing activities as per the plans (GoN 2014).…”

The Implications of Community Forest Income on Social and Environmental Sustainability

“…Numerous studies that examined the income and spending of CFUGs for pro-poor advocacy discovered that, on average, they did spend a sizeable portion (40-80%) of their funds on neighborhood improvement initiatives and that the objectives for rural development derived from CFUG governance were being achieved [10][11][12][13]. Nevertheless, studies have highlighted social disparities, inequities, and biases against poorer CFUG members from benefiting from CFs [14][15][16], despite the evidence that suggests that poverty-reduction strategies also reduce dependency on the environment [17]. Redistribution of CFUG income is contentious and poorly documented due to a lack of research on income and expenditure patterns.…”

Vegetation dynamics in the Madiwatershed, Gandaki Province of Nepal

“…Very little literature is available on vegetation change in the mountain of Nepal and most of them are overall greenery change and increasing greenery on abandoned agricultural land rather than in the former non-cultivated region (Baniya et al 2019, Dahal et al 2020. Preliminary observation has revealed a significant increase in the intensity of natural vegetation even in non-cultivated land.…”