Towards a Sustainable Joint Forest Management Programme: Evidence from Western Midnapore Division in West Bengal

Debnarayan Sarker and Nimai Das

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: This article demonstrates that the resistance movement of forest communities in western Midnapore division in West Bengal, which acted as a key precursor to the joint forest management (JFM) programmes in India through a June 1990 Ministry of Environment and Forests circular, was based to a large extent on the successful experience of JFM in Arabari Hills under this division. In this particular locality, the resistance movement of forest communities had been mobilized for a long time by poor forest communities fighting for their community rights to forest resources as a matter of immediate survival, opposing top-down approaches to forest management. A detailed study of the existing four Forest Protection Committees (FPCs) of this area confirms that these immediate survival needs, generating mainly sustenance and income from non-timber forest products (NTFPs) for FPC members, are the key element for the long-term sustainability of a JFM system.

Keywords: Bengal; environment; forests; joint forest management; sustainable development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2004, Revised 2005
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in South Asia Research 3.26(2006): pp. 269-289

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https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/14890/1/MPRA_paper_14890.pdf revised version (application/pdf)

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