The Hindu : Greens resolve to revive VFCs in D.K.

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 31, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka

Greens resolve to revive VFCs in D.K.

By M. Raghuram

MANGALORE MAY 30. Though the State Government allocated enough funds in the Budget for 2002-03 for the formation of village forest committees (VFC), nothing appears to be happening in Dakshina Kannada District in this direction. The money reserved for this purpose will lapse if it is not claimed by May 31.

The VFC has become important in the present context as in many instances, the Government and the Forest Department are themselves party to the destruction caused to the environment.

Many projects such as the construction of roads through the grasslands of the Kudremukh National Park, laying a pipeline through thick forests, and the proposal to trim the ridgeline of the Western Ghats are threatening the ecology of the district. In Dakshina Kannada, not even one of the 74 VFCs formed in 1994 exists anymore, which means that of the 2800 VFCs in the State, not even one committee is from the district.

But, there is still hope as the diehard greens of the district have decided to revive VFCs, with or without the Government's help.

For the last two centuries, community efforts towards forest management have rarely been taken into account by policymakers and the implementing authority. Forest management, conservation laws, and policies adopted by the country reflect the colonial attitude of distrust of the masses, and hence a deliberate alienation of the local people is seen and their opinion is seldom sought while formulating policies.

After the British took over India's forests, the local people were only left with extraction rights and no management rights. After Independence, successive governments depleted the forests to meet industrial demands. The local people continued to be ignored in conventional forest management practices.

The Federation of Voluntary Organisations for Rural Development-Karnataka (FEVORD-K) is of the opinion that in recent years, there has been a shift from top-down policies and efforts have been made to devolve powers to local users of the forests. Despite these changes, ground realities are not satisfactory. The National Forest Policy of 1988 recognises that meeting environment concerns as well as the people's needs are the two most important objectives of forest management. The policy also emphasises the importance of people's participation in conservation.

This was followed by a circular issued by the Union Government to all the State governments in July 1990 to enable people's participation in forest regeneration.

Close on the heels of this policy change and directive came pressure from various funding agencies as well as activists to implement what was by then called "joint forest management," which provided for collaboration between the local communities and the Forest Department.

In Karnataka, the initiation of the Joint Forest Planning and Management (JFPM) in 1993 coincided with the initiation of the Western Ghats Forestry and Environment Project taken up with funding from the U.K..

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