This session dealt with review of planning processes in each of the project countries. The review consisted of description of planning processes at each level (national, state, region, district, village etc.), identification of its weakness and strengths, and suggestion for improvement. The session specially focused on linkage of forestry technical plan with economic development plan like Five-year Plan, etc. at different levels.
The project provided financial support for a study in each of the South Asian countries to develop a review of forest planning processes for deliberation in this workshop. The implementation of this study varies from country to country for example Nepal has completed the study but Pakistan has yet to sign a contract for conducting this study. The country presentations are attached as Annexes to this report. Following sections present commonalties, variations, strengths and weakness in forest planning processes and its context in these countries.
Main problem with forest sustainability in project countries is the exponentially increasing use of and dependence on forest goods and services by the fast growing population. This coupled with declining enforceability of forest regulations is declining ability of the forest resources to satisfy needs of the society. The crux of the main problem, therefore, lies outside the forestry sector. All other problems including those within the forestry sector like declining productivity and sustainability of forest resources are manifestations of the "main problem". Increasing and excessive stress on limited forest resources is leading to their fragmentation, shrinkage, deforestation, and drift towards lower limits of resiliency.
Most of the forestry problems across all the project countries are local in nature. They mainly include over harvesting of forest resources (fuel wood, grass and shrubs through grazing and browsing, medicinal plants, and timber), cultivation on forestlands, and poaching of wild animals. The semi-urban and urban areas consume most of the marketable goods and services while rural areas in vicinity of forest consume non-marketable forest products and services. The total removal form forests in all project countries are more than the sustainable levels of removal.
At local level, the constraint with forests at most of the locations is the proximity and access of concentrated human settlements to forest resources. At macro level, the main stress on forests comes from national demand of revenue for developmental activities through satisfaction of needs of remote users. The inflexible control of forest resources by the state rather than decentralized and locally sensitive control through social institutions makes the conditions more complex at the local levels. Diverse forest patterns, ranging from growth to degradation, are emerging due to variation in resource availability, enforceability of forest regulations, market pressures and social, economic and ecological conditions.
National forest policies of project countries seek to ensure that resources contribute to social justice and equity, and that they are sustainably managed and used. They direct that the goal of environmental conservation should override financial consideration from forests. All project countries maintain roughly constant annual share of financial resources for development of the forestry sector demonstrating their limited commitment for sustenance of the natural resources and environment. The forestry share generally gets increased only through externally aided forestry projects. The current level of support to forestry sector in all the project countries is not sufficient to maintain the health of their forest resources.
Addressing macro level needs of the state (equity, sustainability and revenue) and micro level satisfaction from forest resources in a sustainable manner with limited available resources is the key issue in forest planning of project countries. The degree of information and models required for this purpose depend on the scale and level of analysis, complexity of integration, objective of planning, present mode of land utilization in terms of different economic functions, and evaluation of land capabilities.
The national forest policies, forest related legislations, institutional culture and the capacity to enforce rules and regulation drives the forest planning processes in the project countries. The concerned institutions are restructured and realigned to reduce transaction costs and to improve efficiency of strategic planning, management, implementation, monitoring for sustainable forest management. Inadequate research information and human resource capacity limits understanding of the problems faced and the opportunities offered by forest resources.
Forest planning is being guided more by the general directions for economic development and is oriented towards increasing production, generating employment, and ultimately alleviating poverty to meet urgent social and economic needs of the countries. The countries are emphasizing, the role of private sector to increase production at the regional level through enhancing investment in production and service-oriented sectors. Functional inter-relations between various regions and sub-regions and between rural and urban sectors are being developed.
The forest planning strategy is being treated as a multi-dimensional mix of strategies that includes reduction of consumption, increased production, effective harvesting, distribution, and utilization, improved pasture and livestock management, legal and institutional improvements, public education, and extension in nature conservation and forestry. In addition, it is now focusing on decentralization by entrusting protection, management, and utilization of forests to the users, and by providing livelihood to poor and landless people in forestry-related activities.
All project-countries are producing both spatial and non-spatial forestry data at different levels and scales and are engaged in land use and forest mapping through satellite imageries mainly for thematic mapping such as national forest cover estimation. Current framework of forest planning is producing and displaying results of various scenarios in visual format (e.g. thematic maps) as well as numerical format using variety of tools like GIS with attached relational databases.
Increasing coordination of forestry sector with other sectors in the project countries has lead to identification of non-forest institutions and agencies that are capable of narrowing the information gaps in forestry sector like on and off farm employment, TOF (trees outside forest), biodiversity, local institutional capabilities, land use and tenure etc.
India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are forest deficient countries at all levels and follow old traditional mode of technical forest planning (working plan) that is not integrated with developmental planning. The technical plan are mostly concerned with supply of forest goods. Levels of potential supplies from forest are re-assessed at the time of revision of the working plan. These countries have the longest history of planned management of forest resources among the project countries.
Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Nepal are forest surplus countries at macro level and have gone for a major transformation in technique and content of forest planning that is linked to varying degrees with the developmental activities for preparing forest management plans rather than working plans. However, for various reasons, Nepal has not been able to implement any management plan. These countries do not exploit most of their forest resources mainly due to insufficient resources to exploit the natural resources.
Level and growth of public participation in forest planning through social forestry, community forestry, and joint forest management in project countries varies with the micro level deficiency of forest resources and degree of enforceability of forest rules and regulations. India, Bangladesh, and Nepal have taken lead in the public participation in forest planning processes. However, such initiatives are implemented as a separate program creating externalities and inefficiency.
There is large variation in composition of human resources among the project countries. Bhutan has the youngest human resources and India has the eldest human resources for planning and managing forests. Other countries fall in between. The average level of technical qualification is the highest in Bhutan.
There is contribution of public forests in the total supply of goods and services by forest and trees varies among countries. Trees outside forest (TOF) are the main source of wood and other tree products in Sri Lanka, while forests are the main suppliers of such goods in Bhutan. Other project countries fall within this range. The degree of market intervention is maximum in forest surplus countries and least in forest deficient countries as the latter are promoting development of forests outside forest areas.
3.4 Weaknesses and Strengths
Long-term national level Forestry Master Plan or Action Plan exists for all the project countries and provide basis for national level forest planning. Other major strength for forest planning flows from rich past experience in traditional forest planning and long time series of information on traditional aspects of forests. In addition, the trained professionals that understand the traditional forest planning at different levels provide excellent framework for the development of forest planning. Finally, the forests that over time have transformed their natural structure to match planning design due to enforced silvicultural systems (uniform, selection, shelter-wood) are in development of alternative planning designs.
Major weaknesses in current forest planning include poor integration within the forestry sector, lack of coordination with other sectors, concentration on supply potential of forest resources, neglect of planning for containing demand of forest goods and services, lower participation of stakeholders, and static and inflexible planning frameworks. Loss of credibility of forest planning due to insufficient allocation of resources for implementation is eroding the efficiency and utility of forest planning in project countries. The financial planning for forestry is centralized, do not respect technical and ground realities, is not need based and do not have a transparent prioritization mechanism.
3.5 Summary
Forest planning system in most of the project countries is broadly the same because the underlying principles and expectations from an effective forest planning are the same across national boundaries. All countries have a long history of forest planning, conduct national inventories to manage forest for traditional commercial purposes, and manage their forests with roughly similar silvicultural and management systems. Further, all project countries appreciate the fact that no strategy of forest planning is likely to succeed unless it meets the needs of most vulnerable sections of local communities that depend on them and have an organic relationship with the forest.
The information gaps and alternative solutions for better forest planning vary among the countries depending on the national forest and economic policies, decentralization of forest authority and control, financial allocation to forestry sector, past history of forest planning and management, degree of integration within forestry sector, coordination of forest planning with other sectors of development, quality and skills of human resource, and above all the institutional structure and culture.
