WG-CIFM

LINKING LEARNING WITH POLICY FORMULATION

The international Working Group on Community Involvement in Forest Management (WG-CIFM) has evolved in the last few years to raise awareness of the roles that communities play in many places around the world in the sustainable management of forests. Over 157 individuals have participated in WG-CIFM sessions representing forest departments, donor agencies, NGOs, and academic institutions from most of the world's regions. The sharing of national experiences provides a clearer picture of common issues, creating opportunities to improve national, regional, and international policies. Funded by the Ford Foundation and the United Kingdom's Department for International Development (DFID) the WG is currently facilitated and administered by the World Conservation Union (IUCN). The WG-CIFM is committed to discovering better ways to engage communities in the sustainable management of forestlands and for providing opportunities to communicate their experience.

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© IUCN

COMMUNITIES AND FOREST MANAGEMENT

IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

Mark Poffenberger, Editor

A REGIONAL PROFILE OF

WG-CIFM

THE WORKING GROUP ON COMMUNITY
INVOLVEMENT IN FOREST MANAGEMENT

FOREWORD TO THE REGIONAL PROFILE, SERIES

This series of regional assessments was initiated by an international group of individuals concerned about the future of the world's forests. We began meeting during the sessions of the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests (IPF) convened by the United Nations in New York and Geneva between 1996 and 1997. In order to promote regional exchange and better inform international policy dialogues, we formed the Working Group on Community Involvement in Forest Management (WG-CIFM). The World Conservation Union (IUCN) agreed to facilitate our activities and administer financial support which was provided by the Ford Foundation and the United Kingdom's Department for International Development (DFID).

The Working Group currently includes forest administrators, planning officers, forest scientists, environmental activists, and diplomats. Our discussions of the underlying causes of deforestation and promising strategies to bring greater stability to the world's forests revealed many similarities between our regions. Most group members agreed that the expansion of government and private industry control over forests in the past century had increasingly undermined the management role of communities in their nations. In some cases this was reflected in the deterioration of indigenous forms of resource stewardship, in others policies did not allow for localized systems of forest rights and responsibilities to be established. Many participants reported that a growing number of communities in their countries are attempting to gain greater control over their forest resources. Nations in both the South and the North are beginning to address this imbalance by developing policies and programs to re-engage communities in forest management decision-making.

During the meetings of the Working Group we noted that many government forestry agencies are under-financed, their budgets cut over the past decade due to political changes and economic restructuring in both developed and developing countries. While the rapidly shrinking public forest base is under unprecedented pressure from industry as well from local and urban public forest consumers, many forestry agencies have been faced with severe financial constraints and staff reductions that frustrated their attempts to sustainably manage their national forests. Economic recessions and government downsizing have been catalysts for innovative solutions to forest management problems.

Working side by side with local communities, some forest agencies are forging new partnerships and approaches to forest management. While the subtle pace of this change cannot stem the criticism from conservationists, industry, and local communities not experiencing change, the dialogues and partnerships have sparked a new dynamic animated by citizen's coalitions and regional processes incorporating diverse stakeholder groups. Our group concluded that these parallels warranted a sharing of community forest management experiences between countries in the hope of accelerating the development of more effective strategies to engage forest stakeholders in sustainable forest management.

Throughout the process of the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests, the Working Group sought to introduce language to the draft recommendations that could contribute toward creating new policies that support greater community involvement in forest management. The Working Group convened six times during the meetings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests between 1996 and 1998. Over 150 individuals have participated in these sessions. The Working Group was able to effectively influence the final text of the IPF that resulted in some 135 proposals for action approved by governments in June 1997 at the United Nations General Assembly Special Session.

In order to extend our exchanges to colleagues and other interested readers who were unable to participate in the Working Group, we decided to establish a monograph series that characterizes some of the diverse community forest management experiences from each of the world's regions, emphasizing community perspectives. We defined "community" broadly to include small forest-dependent settlements, indigenous peoples, as well as the greater civil society. This broad definition presented the challenge of capturing the inevitable diversity of opinion present in the realm of forest "stakeholders'" literally, all those who have ties to or needs that are met through forest environments. Members of the Working Group agreed that the profiles should reflect a range of views of communities, planners, foresters and other stakeholders within each country. The profiles attempt to be both a synthesis and a mosaic of these complex and diverse national and regional realities.

The degree to which community involvement in forest management (CIFM) is recognized by governments and is integrated into state management goals varies widely. Presently, much of the world's forests are used by local communities, whose interactions are mediated through institutions that range from highly traditional to very modem, and whose legal control ranges from nothing to absolute. Because community forest management is often based on local organizations that are frequently unregistered and fall outside formal policies and prescriptions, local forest-dependent inhabitants have been the hidden component of management in the forestry sector. The communities' role may extend from passive engagement to active participation in goal identification, objective setting, controlling implementation, and assessing results. In some areas community involvement and authority may be comprehensive, based on granted legal autonomy or simple isolation. In 1997, the Working Group developed the following chart to reflect the broad spectrum of ways in which communities interface with government management strategies and the varying levels of authority they may hold.

The goal of the regional profile series is to communicate CIFM experiences between regions, targeting diverse audiences including international policy makers and national planners who are responsible for shaping forest management policies and strategies, as well as the forestry practitioners and development specialists who implement them. To familiarize our cross-cultural audience with the national contexts, each regional profile provides a brief summary of the region's forest management history, human ecology, and administrative organizations, followed by a series of CIFM case studies.

Each regional profile is compiled with the collaboration of many individuals and organizations engaged in the countries of the region under review. The contributors include a mix of generalists and in-country specialists who draw on an extensive collection of existing histories, policy reviews, ecological assessments, personal interviews, and case materials. During the assimilation of materials for review, the editor and the contributors participate in national and regional meetings to capture contemporary views and policy trends. Outside reviewers read and comment on a succession of draft manuscripts to better ensure a balanced presentation. Nonetheless, given the controversial nature of the forest policy debate, numerous differences over the interpretation of data or the validity of information are likely to occur. For this reason, the Working Group feels that it is important to act independently of any organization or institution. I hope our readers find these materials useful in seeking new solutions to forest management issues and I take responsibility for any errors or omissions.

— Mark Poffenberger, Series Editor

PREFACE

This regional profile focuses on six Southeast Asian nations including Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam, bringing together the experiences of many individuals, villages, agencies, government and non-government agencies engaged in efforts to strengthen the role of communities in managing the region's forests. Unfortunately, resources were not available to extend the review to Malaysia, Brunei, and Burma. As editor, I made several trips to Southeast Asia to gather materials for this profile, interviewing dozens of individuals and reading through many excellent books and scholarly articles, as well as government documents, project reports, and field memos. In each country that I visited in Southeast Asia, the growing number of committed individuals involved in community forestry policy analysis, project planning, advocacy, research, training, monitoring, and program administration continually impressed me. In this report I have attempted to capture the voices and views of local people, government staff, development workers, researchers, and NGOs, while also providing some historical, ecological, and social context for their interpretation.

It is clear that there are many important components involved in forest management at the policy and field level. What emerged repeatedly during this review was the fundamental question of who should control the natural resources of Southeast Asia? As the population of Southeast Asia has grown, the rural landscape has absorbed millions of people, both indigenous inhabitants as well as migrants. Burgeoning rural communities inevitably compete with internal and external actors for access to natural resources that are part of their production systems. Increased competition for land, water, and forest resources is often an important force driving the need for more clearly defined systems of forest management. The case studies in this report will demonstrate how villagers are attempting to intensify the productivity of existing lands, place tighter use controls on remaining forest lands to protect watersheds, and reach clearer resource use and territorial rights agreements with their neighbors to minimize conflicts.

A major goal of this report is to present the unique perspective and experience of forest-dependent people in the region. Further, I hope to document both the problems and opportunities confronting government and development agencies as they struggle to engage forest dependent people more effectively in management. For several decades the development sector has largely articulated community forestry issues in terms of project activities and technologies including the establishment of village wood lots or support for non-timber forest products collection. For the most part, social forestry initiatives were safely confined to pilot project areas, within a framework of government programs. In recent years, perceptions regarding the role of communities in resource management have begun to change. In some countries, community forestry has begun to emerge as a people's movement, challenging the authority of the state to hold unilateral power over management decision making.

A recurring theme throughout the report is the conflicts over forest control within and among communities as well as with outside actors. It is assumed that meaningful community forest management will require a long-term effort to transfer legal authority downwards to small groups of forest-dependent peoples. After over a century during which forest controls have become increasingly centralized, there is a sense that the pendulum has begun to swing back, with a process of devolution beginning to take place. Yet, as Gilmour and Fisher write in Villagers, Forests, and Foresters, this creates a paradox where government must "use its authority to give away its authority." As this profile will show, the dynamic process of public land reform in the Southeast Asia region is replete with both progress and resistance.

—Mark Poffenberger, Editor

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The goal of this regional profile is to bring together a broad range of experiences with community involvement in forest management (CIFM) from six Southeast Asian nations. This required drawing on the oral and written accounts of dozens of individuals in order to reflect the dynamic forestry contexts present in Southeast Asia. I was fortunate to receive extensive help from those individuals listed as contributors, however, far more people gave to the task of preparing this profile and those are mentioned here.

Part I briefly summarizes some of the forces and pressures forest communities in Southeast Asia are currently facing. I am grateful to CIFOR and the Environmental Investigation Agency for tracking and publishing reports concerning trends and events that threaten the region's natural forests with special thanks to Don Gilmour for reviewing this section.

Part II presents a brief history of forest management in each of the six countries. This section draws on the fine scholarship of Peter Bellwood, Peter Dauvergne, Ronald Edgerton, David Feeny, Karl Hutterer, Nancy Peluso, Richard Tucker, and others.

Part III provides a brief discussion of the major forest bio-regions that exist in Southeast Asia. This section is based on the work of T.C Whitmore, Mark Collins, Jeffrey Sayer, and Dillion Ripley. I am grateful to Peter Ashton at the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University for his review of this section.

In Part IV, national reviews of forest policies and social contexts are based on the contributions of many organizations and people. The Cambodian section draws heavily on the work of Doug Henderson and Kol Vathana. The report on Indonesia was informed through the writing of Suraya Affif and Muayat Ali Muhsi, with additional suggestions and guidance from Jeff Campbell and Martua Sirait. The report on Laos was developed with input from Khamphay Manivong, Manfred Fischer, Carl Mossberg, Marko Katila, Bruce Jeffreys, Peter Jones, and Clive Marsh. The section on evolving community forestry in the Philippines was written by Peter Walpole with special thanks to Tony La Vina at WRI for his review and comments. Karen Lawrence and Anan Kanchanapan authored the national review of CFM in Thailand, with input from Komon Pragtong and Samer Limchoowong. Finally, the section on Vietnam draws heavily on the work of Thomas Sikor, as well as on input from Charles Bailey, Nguyen Huy Phon, and Vo Tri Chung.

The case studies in Part V are based on the work of many organizations and individuals. The Cambodia case study of Ya Poey Commune draws on the excellent work and writing of Sara Colm, with an update on recent events by Don Muller. Jeff Fox provided a fascinating abstract of his findings regarding changing forest vegetation and swidden farming in northwest Cambodia. The Krui case from Indonesia is based on contributions from Hubert de Foresta, Claudia D'Andrea, and Tim Krui, a consortium of CFM researchers. The section on Ban Kamtheuy, Laos was provided by Rachel Dechaineux, Joost Foopes, and Southone Ketphanh. The case studies from the Pantaron Mountains were provided by Peter Walpole, members of the Philippine Working Group and the research and mapping team from the Institute for Environmental Science for Social Change (ESSC). The Thai case study was contributed by Karan Aquino and Karen Lawrence, with additional materials drawn from the fine work of the Northern Development Foundation in Chiang Mai and TERRA staff (Towards Ecological Recovery and Regional Alliance) in Bangkok. The case from northwest Vietnam is extracted from a research project conducted by Asia Forest Network members, including Nguyen Huy Dzung, Vu Van Dzung, and Eric Crystal.

Aside from the contributors to the national and country cases, many other individuals helped make this publication possible. In Vietnam, I am grateful to Hans Helmrich and Michael Glueck who guide the GTZ funded Sustainable Resource Management Project. Hans and Michael provided immense support in synthesizing hundreds of reports on forests and communities in the Mekong River Area, and now offer an excellent web-site where many of these documents are available without charge (www.mekonginfo.org). I am also grateful to all members of the national working group on community involvement in forest management in Cambodia, including Chea Sam Ang, Key Serey Rotha, Wayne Gum, Mao Kosel, as well as to Gordon Patterson, and Andy Maxwell for their help with the Ratanakiri case study. In Thailand, I want to acknowledge the help of Somsak Sukwong, Bob Fisher, Cor Veer, and Michael Victor at RECOFTC, as well as Pat Durst with FAO. Finally, in the Philippines special thanks are due to Sylvia Miclat of AFN/ESSC for facilitating communications, and to members of the Philippine CBFM Working Group.

I am especially grateful to Andrew Ingles, IUCN regional coordinator for South and Southeast Asia, who took the time to read through the entire manuscript and provided many valuable comments. I would also like to express my appreciation to Fran Korten, Michael Conroy, and Walt Coward at the Ford Foundation, and to John Hudson and Pippa Bird at the United Kingdom's Department for International Development (DFID), for supporting the activities of the Working Group on Community Involvement in Forest Management (WG-CIFM), including this second publication in the regional profile series. At the World Conservation Union (IUCN) headquarters, I am grateful to Simon Rietbergen and Ursula Senn for facilitating and administering the Working Group program. Thanks also to Bob Reed and Eric Crystal at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of California at Berkeley for providing encouragement and logistical support for the review. We are also grateful to the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation for supplemental funding for this publication.

My special thanks are due to the production team who worked diligently over the course of a year to bring this report to publication. Kevin Kolb, the cartographer, did a fine job creating the maps. I am grateful for his input and suggestions. Jeffrey Barash handled copy-editing tasks in an effective, thoughtful manner. I am very thankful for his grammatical expertise. I extend my gratitude to Shirley Poffenberger for her careful reading of the manuscript and her suggestions for improvement. I thank Inna Jane Ray for her layout work and Jack van den Brulle at Apollo Press, Berkeley, for printing this report. Finally, I extend my gratitude to Kate Smith-Hanssen, Assistant Series Editor, for helping develop and organize the text into a coherent form and for her thoughtful editing and patience.

—Mark Poffenberger, Editor

TABLE OF CONTENTS