Participatory Forest Management in India: An overview and some emerging issues

Abstract

Joint Forest Management (JFM) represents a radical departure from the tradition of centralised forest management in India. Forest Department (FD) all over the country has started to forge alliances with local communities to regenerate degraded forests adjoining villages. The strides it has made in less than a decade-with 20 states issuing JFM orders; large numbers of forest officers, NGOs and villagers experimenting with new approaches and relationships; and between four to five million hectares of degraded forests regenerating under local care are remarkable. The local community is given more formal access and usufruct rights over a forest patch which they regenerate by protection and plantation. Given its potential of restoring both the health of our forest and the self respect and dignity of impoverished forest users through assured access to forest resources for securer livelihoods, enthusiastic supporters of JFM have understandably tended to monitor positive impacts of achievements through studies and research. A set of studies were conducted during 1995-96 on self-initiated Community Forest Management (CFM) and Joint Forest Management (JFM) systems, with the aim to largely serve as the benchmark or baseline studies to gain a preliminary understanding. Juttadapalem, a small tribal village in the district of Vishakapatnam, A.P., is one of the sites where SPWD supported a research programme in collaboration with Andhra University, Vishakapatnam. The present paper discusses the findings of the sub-network on ecology and economics with Juttadapalem as a case study.