Environmental improvement with trees.

Abstract

Abstract To complement the protection provided by the embankments and other infrastructure, the Char Development and Settlement Project (CDSP) in Bangladesh, in cooperation with the Forest Department, established protective plantations of trees on mud flats, foreshores and embankments using a social forestry approach. In line with the forest policy, social forestry is promoted by giving priority to poorer communities and poorer members of the community in the allocation of contracts for tree plantation. Women and poor people who do not have a land-based source of income are employed on a priority basis in nurseries, plantations, forest management, harvesting and industrial work. This chapter introduces the different types of social forestry programmes included in the CDSP-IV (homestead plantations; embankment, roadside, canal, foreshore and block plantations; and mangrove forest management), and describes the formation of the Social Forestry Groups. Given the importance of afforestation in the process of coping with the increasing consequences of climate change, it is essential that the knowledge and information this Social Forestry Program carries is widely distributed among the coastal population, the Forest Department and the involved NGOs.