Some Methodological and Practical Aspects of Accounting the Returns from Clearfelling Natural Forests in the Evaluation of Intensive Forest Development Projects

Gupta Tirath

IIMA Working Papers from Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Research and Publication Department

Abstract: The Forest Development Corporations (FDCs) in India have the responsibility of formulating and implementing intensive forest development projects for their respective areas. Since the FDCs operate on the lands currently under natural forests, it is important to decide on the procedure for handling the net returns from clearfelling the natural stands in the project area. The forest development projects prepared under the State Planning Programme included the net returns from clearfelling the natural forests with the benefit streams of man-made forestry. The National Commission on Agriculture, a n umber of foresters and economists have agreed with this procedure. The paper has summarised the arguments behind this procedure. These arguments have been examined and found inconsistent with the generally accepted practices of economic analysis. More importantly, the NCA appears to have contradicted itself while accepting the procedure used in the projects formulated under the State Planning Programme. Some real life problems that have arisen due to this procedure have also been discussed. As an alternative, it is suggested that the returns from natural forests on the project areas be treated as capital assets with the FDCs. The concerned State Government(s) may be deemed to have subscribed to the equity capital of the corporation(s) and when the natural stands are clearfelled and the returns received. This procedure is considered to be conceptually consistent and is expected to save some embarrasment to the FDCs.

Date: 1978-07-01
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iim:iimawp:wp00305

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IIMA Working Papers from Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Research and Publication Department Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().