Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
During the present study it was observed that the Forest Development Agencies and Village Forest Committees play an important role in National Afforestation Programs by protection and conservation of natural resources through their active involvement.
This paper is based on a critical literature review and looks into the implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA) in India, with particular reference to the two states of Chhattisgarh and Gujarat. The paper examines the provisions, whatever little the forest-dependent people had since the colonial regime, when modern …
The Ministry is proposing to make some amendments in the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Rules, 2008 to: lay down a procedure for identification or hamlets or settlements and process of consolidation of their lists; increase the mandatory tribal membership of Forest Rights Committees …
This study aims at consolidating information on Community Forest Right (CFR) status and issues in different states in India collected from groups and organizations working in the states including the lessons from the March 2012 consultation, in order to understand the ground level situation regarding their implementation and to provide …
This note is an outcome of contributions of information through the CFR‐LA (Learning and Advocacy) process from multiple Civil Society Organisations and individuals working in implementation of CFRs, observations from CFR case studies undertaken with support from Oxfam and inputs of participants in the National Consultation on CFRs. The National …
The mainstream paradigm of understanding grass-root environmentalism in India as “environmentalism of the poor” might be challenged by an alternative prototype forest movement in the Bengal Dooars prior to the Chipko movement. It was fought against the exploitative design of ecosystem governance under the taungya method of artificial regeneration as …
Recently, on discovering that I work in the forest department, a lady co-passenger in a flight asked, “Are you people really doing anything for the forests?” The unconcealed taunt set me and my friends discussing with the sceptic the scenario of green governance in India. How are we managing our …
The JFM programme faces existential crisis. On the one hand, pieces of legislation like the Forest Rights Act (FRA), 2006, and the Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas (PESA) Act, 1996, have come into existence, giving rights to tribals and forest dwellers over forest resources and their management. On the other …
This response to the comment “Protecting India’s Protected Areas” by Praveen Bhargav and Shekar Dattatri (23 April 2011) points out the authors’ misreading of the Forest Rights Act and also of the report of the Joint Committee on the FRA.
THE past two rainy seasons 65-year-old Ramdas Rana has spent much of his sleeping hours adjusting his bed to an elusive dry patch. The thatched roof of his hut has been leaking since 2008. He could not repair it because the grass used for thatching is out of bounds for …
PEOPLE on the fringes of Kaziranga National Park are anxious. They fear eviction. On January 9, the Assam gover nment issued eviction notices to 10 families in the Kohora range of the park. Others in 16 villages, marked for park extension, fear it could be their turn next. Residents of …
The Ministry of Environment and Forests has withdrawn its latest guidelines for creating inviolate space for wildlife. The guidelines for creating Critical wildlife Habitat (CWH), issued on February 7, violated the Forest Rights Act, 2006, and threatened the interests of the forest dwellers (see: ‘Misguided rules’). The ministry also asked …
Top forest officials and members of the National Forest Rights Act Committee are on a collision course after the panel submitted its report to the government and stated that the Act was not implemented in its true spirit. A war of words ensued after the panel, formed by the environment …
The Union government is reviewing its landmark initiative, the Forest Rights Act, four years after enacting it and two high-level groups submitted their assessment in the first week of January. But the environment ministry is in no mood to accept Forest Rights Act review finds out Down To Earth. The …
Each tribal family will get up to 10 acres of land Revenue Minister to hand over documents to families in Kannampady settlement 128 tribal settlements in Idukki district KATTAPPANA: Minister for Revenue K.P. Rajendran will on Thursday hand over land documents, under the Forest Rights Act 2006, to 306 Adivasi …
This report by National Committee on Forest Rights Act (FRA) submitted by N C Saxena to Shri Kantilal Bhuria, Union Minister of tribal affairs says that with notable exceptions, the implementation of FRA has been poor & includes recommendations for implementing it effectively. The Ministry of Environment and Forests and …
This paper considers the relationship between the emergence and development of state forestry institutions in forested landscapes of West Bengal and the chronic and acute poverty of citizens living there. At least 13% of West Bengal
Indigenous communities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHTs) of Bangladesh are managing forests around their homesteads in a sustainable way despite exclusion of customary rights on government managed reserved forests,. Bangladesh, as one of the forest poor countries in the world, is continuously struggling to conserve its forest resources. However, …
THE forest departments of Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat are forcibly evicting tribals from forestland. Around 50 huts of the Korku community in Madhya Pradesh were demolished on August 29. On July 30, forest guards assaulted tribals of the Kunbi community for cultivating in forestland in Dang district in Gujarat. The …
