Abstract
Benefit-sharing mechanisms between forest-based communities and governments are a way to meet conservation goals in developing countries, while still allowing forest-based income for local people. In Vietnam, the government implemented a pilot Benefit Sharing Mechanism (BSM) in Special Use Forests (SUFs), to develop a legal framework for sharing the benefits, rights, and responsibilities of forest conservation and management with local communities. One of the pilot areas is in Bach Ma National Park. We examined community involvement in the BSM pilot scheme in SUFs in the buffer zone of Bach Ma National Park located in Thuong Nhat commune, Nam Dong District. Sixty household surveys from two villages were undertaken in 2014. Most households agreed there were benefits, but some reported difficulties. Analysis of harvested non-timber forest products (NTFPs) showed a nearly 30% increase in average household income, based on regulated access to harvesting NTFPs by registered forest users. The difficulties experienced by those involved in the BSM pilot scheme included declining meeting attendance, infrequent meetings, harvested amounts of some NTFPs exceeding those allowed by the Benefit Sharing Arrangement, and forest protection teams failing to detect such irregularities. Finally, we suggest a number of improvements to BSM policies, such as incentives for forest protection team members to be more actively involved in harvest monitoring.
Highlights
In many tropical developing countries, where biodiversity is high and local communities still rely on the natural environment for their livelihoods, the expansion of environmentally protected areas raises issues of equity for those dependent on the forests for their livelihood [1,2]
Household profile In the household surveys, village 1 and 2 were similar in their socio-economic profile, the results will be presented as one study group, which importantly enables comparison to baseline data collected by a previous study on harvesting of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) [29]
In response to questions related to occupation, many people said that income derived from farming was still inadequate to meet their family needs, and the NTFPs offer an alternative income stream as they are sold locally
Summary
In many tropical developing countries, where biodiversity is high and local communities still rely on the natural environment for their livelihoods, the expansion of environmentally protected areas raises issues of equity for those dependent on the forests for their livelihood [1,2]. Setting aside protected areas fails to achieve the dual goals of conservation and preservation of local and indigenous people’s traditional forest rights and practices [3,4]. Inability to manage both goals has led to conflicts and mistrust between managers of protected areas and local forest user communities, resulting in a failure to meet conservation goals of protected areas [5,6]. Co-management is described as “the sharing of power and responsibility between government and local resource users”[10], and participatory, collaborative, or joint management [11]
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