Forestry in India A Story of Management Failure Presented by Smruti(42) Nirbhay(29)

1. Forestry in India A Story of Management Failure Presented by Smruti(42) Nirbhay(29)

2. What is forestry • Creation, conservation and scientific management of forests and utilization of their resources. • protection, perpetuation, menstruation, management, valuation and finance as well as utilization of forest products.

3. Facts about Indian forest • per capita forest land is only 0.08 hectare • About 200 million is partially or wholly dependent on forest resources for their livelihoods. • Forestry contribute about 1 per cent to GDP • Large-scale industry - pulp and paper - uses only about 10% of forest raw material, while about 23,000 sawmills and a large number of cottage unit's process 90%.

4. The unrecorded and partly illegal felling amounts to more than half of the commercially harvested timber and firewood • Recorded forest in India -67.5 mha(20.55%) • actual forest cover -63.3mha (19.27%) • Only 38 million ha of forests are well stocked (crown density above 40%).

5. History of forest management • Ancient Indian scriptures and literature mention forest management • scientific study of managed forests and came with the colonial rule only • The Indian Forest Department was set up with British officers in senior positions and Indian officers to assist them. 

6. Forest Act of 1878-control of all reserved forests including harvesting if timber and restricting access of the people and livestock to these forests. • 1890 almost every province in India had a permanent forest administration to look after the state forests. • Historically India had forest cover 65% • It shrunk to 40% by the middle of the century • Since India’s independence the figure has shrunk to 19% today.

7. Causes of forest management failure • Indian Forest Act 1927 -restricting people’s access to ‘government’ forests • The Forest Act 1952- village communities should in no event be permitted to use forests at the cost of 'national interest'. • rights to manage forests were vested with the state governments till 1976 • After that forests put on the concurrent list

8. Prior to the Forest (Conservation ) Act 1980 the state governments could take any forest land out of forestry and put to other use such as agriculture, roads, and habitation settlement. • Until 1988, the policy lands used for commercial purposes

9. Trends in Forest Management • Social forestry- moving tree planting activities away from traditional forests and into other common lands and private lands • It intended to serve the needs of the people at their ‘doors’ and reduce their dependence upon the natural forests. • It provided incentive to large-scale industries to clear fell ecologically valuable degraded forest areas and common property lands for plantations.

10. It created a uniform monoculture of timber species. • It escalated commercial felling • CFM, PFM, JFM emerged out of the failure of colonial and social forestry and the Indian government’s forest policies in general. • CFM-local community initiatives towards regenerating, protecting and managing public and other forest lands.

11. (PFM) management systems that are collaborative in nature. • The Sukho Majri project underlined the imperative of involving the communities in the protection, conservation, management and sharing of natural resources. • Forest Policy in 1988 • Shifting the focus from revenue generation to conservation • Answering the subsistence needs of the communities. • The policy gives higher priority to environmental stability than to earning revenue. • It discourages monocultures and prefers mixed forest • The rights and concessions enjoyed by them should be fully protected.

12. JFM) refers to formalized local community and forest department agreements relating to regenerating, protecting and managing state owned, public forest lands. • The ministry issued guidelines on June 1 1990 regarding jfm. • share in usufructs • MP provides100% share of the net profit of the harvesting of timber and bamboo to the JFM.

13. As on10.9.2003- 84632 JFM committees • looking after 17.33 million ha of forest lands except Meghalaya ( which adopted JFM after 10.9.2003) • 28 State Governments have adopted JFM. • Almost 60% of the forest cover within the tribal districts of the country, and the tribal families are automatically covered in the JFM programme in these areas.

14. As on 10.9.2003, approximately 8.4 million families were involved in JFM programme out of which approximately 2.7 million were ST families. •  to support JFM programme, National Afforestation Programme (NAP) Scheme in the X Plan i.e., Samanvit Gram Vanikaran Samridhi Yojana (SGVSY) Scheme. • implemented through a two-tier decentralized institutional set-up

15. As on 30.11.2004, 561 FDA Projects were operational in all 28 states at a total cost of Rs.1,344.62 Corers to treat 8.13 lakh ha. through 19,234 JFMCs. • Tribal families are automatically covered as the NAP. • 50% reservation for women members of both General Body and Executive Body of both the JFM Committee and the FDA should be women.

16. Shifting of forest policies towards conservation • 1980 the Forest (Conservation) Act- to check uncontrolled diversion of forest areas for other purposes, particularly for agriculture and human settlement. • state govt. cannot de-reserve Reserved Forests or divert forest lands for non-forest purposes without the permission from GOI. • The states cannot now lease out forests to the private entrepreneurs/ Corporations not owned by government.

17. Management concern • PFM not extended to protected areas and well-stocked forests • lack of clarity regarding tenure • the extent of forestry department control within JFM is significant. • village organizations in most states have no autonomous status and can be dissolved by the forestry department.

18. Some provision should take into consideration • Provide clear policy signals to the forest-based private sector • Remove bottlenecks to farm forestry and cut back on subsidized supply of raw material to industry • Tackle intra-community inequity • Incorporate farm forestry in watershed development programmes

19. Forest Resource Management (FRM) in India O BJECTIVE- • To achieve the optimum development of forest resources for attaining the overall goal of sustainable development. • Managing forest resource to meet present needs without compromising the needs of future generations. • Restoring damaged ecologies. • To develop and strengthen the stakes of the local community in the management of forest resources.

20. To optimize the environmental service rendered by forests. • First charge on the productivity of the forests should be of the local people for their essential livelihood needs • National Forest Policy, 1988 has emphasized the of preparation of WP WP • Infusion of new management practices based on forest science. • Infusion of modern technology in FRM.

21. CONCLUSION • single-use strategies inadequate for local development. • Adopting a contemporary, multiple-use strategy. • Focusing on generating multiple products

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