Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Protecting forests, improving livelihoods

Community Forestry
in Nepal

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Contents

Acronyms 4

Summary 5

1 History: Three phases of community forests in Nepal 6

2 Community forestry in Nepal – Successes 11

3 Community forestry in Nepal – Challenges 12

4 Conclusion and recommendations – Reasons for sucess of community forests

in Nepal 13

5 Bibliography 18

Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Authors: Ghan Shyam Pandey & Bijaya Raj Paudyall

Coverphoto: Antoine Thibaud (Flickr CC)

Thanks to: Global Alliance of Community Forestry. Green Foundation Nepal.

isbn: 978-1-906607-57-9

September 2015

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Many of Fern’s partner organisations have lobbied for the creation of

community forests under the revision of their forest legislation, or as part of the
Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership
Agreement or Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD)
processes, believing that community forests could allow communities to
directly benefit from forest management.

To inform this work, Fern commissioned a series of papers on community

forestry policies in four different countries (Cameroon, Guatemala, Mexico,
and Nepal). The aim of the papers is to learn from the successes and challenges
faced by these existing community forest policies, to help non-governmental
organisations in other countries develop, advocate for and implement their own
community forest policies.
These papers informed discussions at a workshop held in Brussels in April
2014, which brought together participants from thirty countries to share their
understanding and experience of community forestry, and develop action plans
for their own countries.
This paper is one of four in this series. The other papers, and further resources
on community-based livelihood models, can be found at fern.org/small-scale-
livelihoods

Photo: Antoine Thibaud (Flickr CC)

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Acronyms

CFUG Community Forest User Groups

COFSUN Community-based Forestry Supporters’ Network
FAO UN Food and Agriculture Organisation
FECOFUN Federation of Community Forest Users of Nepal
GDP Gross Domestic Product
HIMAWANTI Himalayan Grassroots Women’s Natural Resource Management Association
NAFP Nepal–Australia Forestry Project
NGO Non-governmental organisation
SIDA Swedish International Development Authority

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Summary

Community forests have existed in their modern form in Nepal since 1987, when the government
began a phased handover of state-owned forests to communities. The government hoped this
would be an incentive for communities to conserve and restore what were by that point heavily
degraded forests. Under the government policy, communities can apply for an extendable 10-year
concession, governed by a constitution and management plan prepared by the communities with
the support of government experts. They are free to manage and sell forest resources as they wish.

The policy has achieved high uptake levels, with 30 per cent of Nepal’s forests now managed
by community user groups. Community forests have been particularly praised for improving
environmental quality in mountainous regions where they have reduced erosion, protected
watersheds and increased agricultural output. Positive social benefits include increased participation
and status of marginalised groups. Community forests have also contributed to local economic
development: besides generating income and creating jobs for local communities, they have
allowed the development of on-site added-value processing of raw materials.

There have also been challenges. The focus has been on forest protection and not sustainable timber
harvesting, meaning communities are missing opportunities to develop economic self-sufficiency.
Marginalised groups still face difficulties accessing forest products and markets, and the current
community forest model is only available to community groups; there are no options for individuals
or households.

Nepal’s experience teaches several lessons. First, the importance of political commitment in ensuring
the success of community forests; second, involving stakeholders in policy-making ensures buy-in as
well as strong policies that reflect experience on the ground; third, strong civil society organisations
and community forest networks are vital for awareness-raising, capacity-building, and supporting
communities’ participation. Community forest policies should actively promote the involvement
of marginalised groups: in Nepal, 50 per cent quotas for women at all levels of community forest
decision-making bodies have ensured women play a leading role.

The paper concludes with several recommendations for improving community forests: Stakeholder
consultation in policy formation still needs to be improved; political commitment needs to
be secured at all levels of government; and the economic contribution of community forestry
needs to be recognised in the national budget. The environmental contribution should also be
better understood: at the moment, creation of strict protected nature reserves is on the rise,
and community forests need to be acknowledged as an ecologically-sound alternative. Finally,
communities still lack important forest management skills, and need continued support with this.

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

1 History: Three phases of community

forests in Nepal

Definitions

Panchayat: A system of local government widespread in South Asia. It is the smallest

unit of government.

Panchayat Forest: any public forest land, barren or with bushes, at least two-thirds of
which need planting, which is handed over to the relevant Panchayat.

Panchayat Protected Forest: any public forests which need protection and
reforestation and have been handed over to the relevant Panchayat.

1.1 Pre-Panchayat regime (1768–1961)

The king who unified modern Nepal in 1768, Prithivi Narayan Shah, started a system of distributing
land in the form of grants to the military, government officials and nobles. Many of these were
allocated in forest areas, which were then often deforested as they were brought into cultivation.
When the old regime fell in the mid-20th century, these private land grants were nationalised under
the 1957 Private Forest Nationalisation Act. However, government control was not effective, due to
lack of skilled staff and shortfalls in funding, planning, research, record-keeping and management.
In many cases, the old local users retained de facto control over the forests and were not affected by
the Nationalisation Act, particularly where forests were managed traditionally by user groups with
strong leadership.

1.2 Panchayat regime (1962-1990)

Between 1962 and 1990, the nationalisation of private forests and the rapidly increasing population
resulted in a large amount of forest degradation. The lack of private ownership and weak
enforcement from the government led to a forest exploitation free-for-all, particularly to meet food,
fuel and housing demands. Rapid degradation occurred between 1951 and 1963, which coincided
with a period of unstable government.1

In 1973, the District Forest Offices in two areas joined forces with local people and issued a
statement calling for forest protection. This spread to other districts across the country and resulted
in the 1976 National Forest Plan, which included an objective for public participation in forestry. It
made provisions for the establishment of Panchayat Forests and Panchayat Protected Forests.

In 1976, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) commissioned a study in collaboration with
the Swedish International Development Authority (SIDA), which resulted in the landmark document

1 Joshi 1989

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Forestry for Local Community Development.2 In 1978, the government of Nepal brought legislation in
line with the 1976 National Forest Plan and the FAO study, and gave local people the responsibility
for managing common property.

Case Study: Lessons learned from the Panchayat system

Sano Ban (Pandey Goan) Forest

Sano Ban Community Forest is a Panchayat Forest in the Tukucha Panchayat
comprising about 27 hectares. It was created after a detailed survey of the whole
Tukucha Panchayat showed that there were 14 patches of forest situated in nine wards,
and that some of the dependent populations had been using the forest resources for
generations. The forested area was divided into separate sections with separate user
groups.

In one area, two user groups claimed use rights and each disputed the claims of
the other. The Forest Department and Nepal–Australia Forestry Project (NAFP)
staff facilitated negotiations, but ultimately left the settlement of disputes to local
initiatives. Visits by the outside parties were initially informal, and formal meetings
only took place once the communities had had time to discuss the issues amongst
themselves. This seemed to work well and two important lessons were learnt for future
Community Forests:

(1) Consensus is an essential part of forest management and this takes time;
community consultation cannot be limited to one or a few public meetings.

(2) Obtaining information to develop management plans does not require large
meetings or formal surveys. Informal discussions are effective and enable divergent
interests to be considered.

A simple management plan was prepared for the Sano Ban Forest and handed over to
forest user groups through the Panchayat, which became the first Community Forest
User Group-based community forest in Nepal. A number of high-level officials and
observers have visited the Tukucha to observe the process and techniques adopted.

1.3 Democratic and Republican Regime (1989 to the present)

In present-day Nepal the term ‘community forest’ means a state-owned forest handed over to a
users’ group for development, conservation and use in pursuit of their collective interest. The legal
backbone for this was set out in the Forest Act (1993), the Forest Regulation (1995), Guidelines for
Community Forestry Inventory (2004), and the Guidelines for Community Forestry Development
Program (2009). The government states that it wants to transfer forests to communities in this way to
incentivise forest conservation.

2 Baral 1999

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The lessons learned from the Sano Ban Forest (see Case Study) have informed modern community
forestry policy in Nepal. The main lessons were that forest management should be based on
pre-existing user groups rather than political boundaries; that forests should be handed over to the
identified users themselves rather than a local government entity; and that existing protection and
use activities should be mainstreamed in a newly prepared simple management plan.

In 1989 the Nepalese government endorsed a Master Plan for the Forestry Sector, with principles
informed by knowledge gained in the Sano Ban forest and from indigenous systems. The key
elements of the community forestry policy are as follows:3

—— phased handing over of forests by government to communities, insofar as they are able and
willing to manage them

—— formulating simple management plans as quickly as possible, with a view to regulating

harvesting to stay within sustainable yield for the long term

—— retraining the entire staff of the Ministry of Forest and Soil Conservation for their new role as
advisors and facilitators to enhance capacity of the local users, rather than policing the forests

—— maintaining the ecological and environmental balance and the biological diversity necessary
for the sustained well-being of the nation

—— evaluating environmental impacts when implementing development programmes

—— distributing fuel-efficient stoves to reduce consumption of fuel-wood.

Creation of a community forest

The Forest Act 1993 provided a clear legal basis for community forestry, enabling the government to
hand over identified areas of state-owned forest to Community Forest User Groups (CFUGs).

CFUGs are legal, autonomous corporate bodies, governed by a general assembly consisting of all
households in the boundaries of the applicant community, and an executive committee chosen
by the CFUG through consensus or election. User groups who want to manage a community
forest must submit a written application to the government, which then sends a technical
expert to help the communities prepare a constitution, respecting the guidelines set out in the
Forest Regulations 1995. Decisions must be made on a consensual basis, and boundaries with
neighbouring communities must be respected. The CFUG must then prepare a management plan
to govern the community forest, also assisted by government staff. The management plan describes
the community forest area, and outlines the activities that will take place within it over its ten-year
lifetime (though this period can be extended – see below).

What do communities get rights over?

Once created in this way, a CFUG has the full right to manage the forest and use its resources,
according to the constitution and forest management plan submitted to the government, and in line
with decisions taken by their assemblies.4

Activities carried out within the community forest are decided through a participatory process,

3 Nepal HMG 1988

4 Pokharel et al. 2007

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

based on local needs of users. These may include conservation, timber extraction, agriculture, the
rearing of livestock and the collection of non-timber forest products, as well as producing and
processing all these products and assets. The CFUG may use these products for their domestic needs;
and they have the right to sell forest products according to prices fixed in the management plan. The
government taxes such sales at 15 per cent.

CFUGs have the right to the community forest for a maximum period of ten years, with the
possibility of extension. The community’s right over the forest is thus not an ownership right; the
land legally remains the property of the state. This arrangement has not been without controversy.
Some non-governmental organisations (NGOs) object to the fact that communities only have
limited-term management rights, and call for ownership to be handed over outright.

Management plans

Under the Panchayat regime, the government produced a simple format for the preparation of
management plans. However, there were no proper guidelines for conducting inventories of forest
resources and users, or about how to involve and empower users. Under the new community forest
policy, new interim guidelines were developed. These provided methodologies for conducting
forest and user inventories, negotiation procedures, forest development, and management plan
preparation, implementation and monitoring.

In 2001 and 2009, the operational guidelines were revised with intensive interaction with
stakeholders. The previous guidelines did not sufficiently incorporate communities’ opinions
or support marginalised groups, and attempts were often made to form user groups before
communities were empowered.

The present (2014) guidelines pay close attention to involving marginalised groups, with economic
activities, capacity-building, land allocation, and reporting tools developed specifically for their
needs.

In particular, the latest community forestry policy has set out quotas for marginalised groups in
CFUG management committees. These state that a CFUG management committee must contain at
least 50 per cent women representatives, with the remaining 50 per cent including proportionate
representation from the poor, lower-caste groups, minority ethnic groups and indigenous people.
Either the chairperson or the secretary of the committee must be a woman.

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Photo: Antoine Thibaud (Flickr CC)

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

2 Community forestry in Nepal – Successes

The Nepalese government has identified that about 60 per cent of Nepal’s total forest area has the
potential for community forestry.5 In practice, community forests cover nearly 30 per cent of the
total forest area and 48 per cent of the area identified as having the potential for community forests.
More than 130,000 user groups are involved in community forestry, with more than two million
households benefitting from their management of 1.7 million hectares of community forests.6

Community forests have also created natural capital in the form of new forests, and improved
existing forest conditions and biodiversity. According to a 2013 report from the Ministry of Forests
and Soil Conservation, forest conditions have improved overall since the handover to CFUGs, with 86
per cent showing improvements in forest conditions.7This effect has been particularly pronounced
in the mountainous regions, where CFUGs have significantly increased the area of forested land, thus
reducing landslides and soil erosion, protecting watersheds, and increasing the country’s agricultural
output.

In 2011, Nepal’s Ministry of Forests and Soil Conservation conducted an in-depth national survey
of households in 137 CFUGs across the country,8 which concluded that community forests have
increased the participation and incomes of the rural poor, women and Dalits (lower-caste groups).
Community forests have also enhanced the capacity of local people for planning and implementing
forestry and other development work. Their decentralised approach to policy-making and
budgeting has made them popular with communities. The economic benefits have been particularly
pronounced. Besides the income generated by agriculture and the collection of raw forest products,
CFUGs have also been engaged in on-site added-value processing of raw materials, with positive
results for local economic development.

The same government report showed that an average of 640 days of employment are created for
each CFUG, which at an average salary of US$2 per day (for unskilled manual labour). The study
claims that CFUGs make an average profit of US$1144 per year, totalling US$13.7 million for CFUGs
across the country. Income generation varies greatly, however, depending on the size of the forests.
There are major differences between the income generated by forest areas of more than 100
hectares, and those under.

Currently 25 per cent of total income from the community forest must be used for the management,
protection and development of the forest itself; 35 per cent must be mobilised for programmes
targeted to marginalised groups, as identified by the government’s participatory well-being
ranking.9 Each CFUG decides how to spend this money, based on government guidelines and its
own management plan. Community forest advocates are now arguing that more funds need to
be directed towards individual households, rather than primarily being spent on collective forest
management and community development.

5 HMGN 1995
6 DoF 2013
7 MFSC 2013
8 MFSC 2013
9 GoN 2009

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

3 Community forestry in Nepal – Challenges

Although there have been many positive statements made about the effect of community forestry
in Nepal, there are also concerns. One complaint is that there has been little promotion of harvesting
forest products. This has meant communities have not fully benefitted from the productivity of their
forests; it has also increased the risk of forest fires.

Poor households have also faced disadvantages in accessing and purchasing timber. The present
policy makes no positive discrimination in their favour, and more needs to be done to ensure they
benefit from the sale of forest products. A number of CFUGs have recently initiated such positive
discrimination practices; this could be replicated throughout the country.

Another important future step should be the development of private forest ownership for individual
households. Community forests, as stated above, only grant management rights to communities.
Private ownership would give households full access to forest products, and have direct benefits on
their income. Yet there has been insufficient support from the government in developing private
ownership. Only 2,455 private forests, covering an area of 2,360 hectares, are registered in the
country.

In addition, there is a long way to go before the full potential of community forestry in Nepal is
reached. The governmental Department of Forest Research and Surveys found that the total value
of forest goods (timber, fuel wood, non-timber forest products, wildlife, and soil) and services
(recreation, oxygen production, carbon sequestration and soil conservation) of the forestry sector
would be 28 per cent of the total projected Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Nepal in 2008.
However, the current GDP contribution of goods from the forestry sector is only 9.45 per cent. There
is a lot of unfulfilled economic potential in Nepal’s forests that community forestry has yet to unlock.

Finally, community forest formation has slowed in recent years (as shown in Chart 1 below) due to
decreased land availability, inconsistent political will, and reduced funding.

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

4 Conclusion and recommendations –

Reasons for sucess of community forests
in Nepal

Community forestry in Nepal has led to some notable benefits for communities and normally
disempowered sectors of society. The successes can be put down to a number of factors, including:

Political commitment

The success of community forestry in Nepal owes much to high levels of political commitment. This
was due in large part to the support of civil society and community-based organisations, such as
the Federation of Community Forest Users of Nepal (FECOFUN). The government’s vision for the
forestry sector now includes community forestry as a major component, and gives it high priority
and substantial funding in the three-year national plan (2013–2016).10 It is also conducting capacity-
building to help the local districts implement community forestry.

When this political commitment wanes, community forests suffer accordingly. The below chart
shows fluctuations in the rate of creation of new community forests since the launch of the policy in
1987:

Chart 1: trends of community forest formation in Nepal

New community forests created per year

2000
1800
1600
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
1987

1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995

1997

1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005

2007

2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
1988

1996

1998

2006

2008

Chart 1 shows that the first community forests were created in 1987, in just a few districts, and rose
slowly after the approval of the Master Plan for the forestry sector in 1989. The Forest Act 1993 and
the Forest Regulations 1995 jump-started the registration, management planning and handover
of community forests. The number of community forests in the country increased dramatically

10 NPC 2013

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 Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

between 1991 and 1996, particularly in the easily accessible hill areas. However, due to the ten
years of political insurgency that followed, the rate of community forest creation heavily decreased:
government staff could not easily move around the country, and the priority of donor partners
changed from forestry to peace building. After the success of the second revolution in 2006, the
trend seemed to turn upwards again, but was halted by the government passing a policy to stop
handing over the forests. This policy was reversed in 2010 and met with an increase in community
forest creation, but this again was followed by a policy that has made community forestry creation
more complicated and restricted its budget.

This experience shows how important it is that the government and donor institutions maintain
high levels of political support for community forestry: if financial support drops, or rules for the
creation and management of community forests become too strict, community forests suffer.

Stakeholder involvement in policy-making

Government efforts to actively involve stakeholders in policy formation have also been important.
The government worked with NGOs and the private sector to organise national workshops to
develop the central policies and regulations now governing community forestry. The first workshop,
in 1987, resulted in the Forestry Sector Master Plan. Subsequent workshops have produced the
Forest Act and Forest Regulations, and helped to establish FECOFUN’s network of community
forestry.

Role of civil society

A number of NGOs have emerged to bolster support for community forestry. These have played
an important role in creating awareness of community forestry, conducting capacity-building
and experience-sharing amongst different CFUGs, and supporting communities’ participation in
national-level policy-making.

FECOFUN is one of the most significant of these groups. It is a formal network of CFUGs, which
strives to promote their rights and strengthen their role in policy-making processes. Since its
inception in July 1995, FECOFUN has grown to include nearly 80 per cent of the country’s CFUGs,
comprising around 10 million people. Another important organisation has been the Community-
based Forestry Supporters’ Network (COFSUN), an NGO that supports community forestry by
promoting experience-sharing and capacity-building among CFUGs. Finally, an important role has
been played by the Himalayan Grassroots Women’s Natural Resource Management Association
(HIMAWANTI), an NGO dedicated to strengthening the role of women in sustainable natural resource
management at the grass-roots level.

CFUGs and their networks of supporting NGOs have been effective not only in forest rights
campaigns, but also in reforming Nepal’s political system. This dialogue has had a positive effect on
community forestry. FECOFUN has maintained a style of democratic and inclusive decision-making
which, due to FECOFUN’s size and influence, has become a role model for government policy
formation processes on community forestry.

Involvement of marginalised groups

Active efforts to involve marginalised groups (such as positive discrimination quotas and other
legal requirements) have been crucial to the success of community forestry. As a result, more than
a thousand CFUGs are headed by women, and this number continues to increase. The process for
developing community forest constitutions and management plans allows the most vulnerable to
be identified and their varying needs and potential contribution to be understood, permitting the
provision of specially targeted support by the government.

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Protecting forests, improving livelihoods – Community forestry in Nepal

Recommendations for improvement

As well as continuing to implement the policies in the ways outlined above, the following
recommendations show ways in which community forestry in Nepal can be strengthened:

Improve the consultation process for forming forest policies

Although the government has made efforts to involve stakeholders in policy discussions,
ensuring NGOs and communities’ knowledge is fully utilised would improve both policies and
implementation. It is essential that policies relating to land rights, wood categorisation, royalties for
timber and non-timber forest products, benefit-sharing mechanisms, and conversion of community
forest land to non-forest purposes are written in conjunction with key stakeholders such as
FECOFUN.

Ensure commitment at all levels of government

Despite the strength of the legal framework around community forestry, control continues to be
centralised and the government has proved reluctant to hand over community forests to CFUGs.
There are frequent failures to finalise the creation of community forests even once they have been
successfully registered in the District Forest Office. Thus a large number of CFUGs, despite preparing
constitutions and management plans, have not in practice received their community forests.

Meanwhile, the government is allocating community land for non-forestry purposes. FECOFUN has
drawn attention to the creation of new settlements and army and police camps in forest areas, and
it says that encroachment into forest land is increasing.11 This has been escalated by the failure to
implement the national land-use policy, which the government should now focus on as a priority.12

Include the economic contribution of community forests in the national budget

The forestry sector, and particularly community forestry, should be a government priority for
investment and business promotion. A valuation of forest resources should be conducted, and
reflected in the budget as natural capital.

Consider community forestry in place of protected areas

Twenty three per cent of Nepal is already defined as protected areas, and this is on the rise.
Community land areas are at risk of being taken over by the government. NGOs have shown that
conservation can be achieved through community forestry: local communities have been protecting
the forest for many years.

Capacity of CFUGs needs increasing

CFUGs are running their institutions to the best of their abilities, but this is still inadequate for
effective forest management. The capacity of CFUGs urgently needs to be increased, particularly to
help them develop more scientific forest management and reporting systems.

11 NEFEJ 2012
12 Pandey 2012

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Photo: Antoine Thibaud (Flickr CC)

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