Abstract
There are positive and negative feed-back links between forestry and poverty. The role of forests as part of a rural development strategy is much debated in literature. We have explored this role and links for a montane forest village in East China using official historical data and our own field survey of 92 households. The opportunities that forest resources have offered to farmers at different stages of socio-economic development are identified. The changes in farmers' livelihood strategies caused by using forest products and the associated increase of inequalities are assessed. Forest management has been gradually shifting from a focus on forest production centred on bamboo to a multipurpose orientation in which conservation to promote tourism has become increasingly important. While bamboo still remains the main income equaliser factor, different forest products add to the portfolio of opportunities of upper and lower income farmers as they move along their development ladders.
Highlights
Forestlands have been widely associated with the incidence of rural poverty throughout the world (Angelsen and Wunder 2003, Chomitz 2007, Kaimowitz 2002, Sunderlin et al 2005)
A household field survey was conducted in Daxi in 2005 and supplemented with data from the official Daxi records of 1969 to 2006 provided by the local administration. These data are complemented by key informant interviews, Tian Huang Ping’s Forest Station statistics and our own land-use survey based on remote sensing analysis
Income data from historical village records were grouped in three main categories: agriculture, forestry and off-farm income
Summary
Forestlands have been widely associated with the incidence of rural poverty throughout the world (Angelsen and Wunder 2003, Chomitz 2007, Kaimowitz 2002, Sunderlin et al 2005). AmbrosseOji (2003), Kamanga et al (2009) and Ruiz Perez et al (1999) have found that the relative contribution of forest income to different farmers’ revenues depends upon the alternative options available, and that in forested regions the middle income group of farmers tends to depend more on forest activities under mature economic conditions. These studies tend to be based on the assumption that forestrelated incomes and opportunities for poverty alleviation are relatively stable over time which depends on context and cannot be generally assumed
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