2nd Day Forest

Forest
Forests are the largest natural resource in terms of area coverage. A majority of the Nepalese people use the products of forests for firewood, fodder, timber, and medicines. As a result, the forest has dwindled in both area and quality due to the constantly increasing demands of the people for forest products (Table 2.3) .
About 29% of the area of Nepal is under forest coverage and 10.6% is under shrubs or so-called degraded forest coverage. The forest area, which was 45% in 1966 and 37% in 1986, has declined considerably. Conversely, the shrub land area doubled from 5% in early 1980 to 10.6% in mid-1990. The annual deforestation rate is estimated to be 1.7% (DFRS 1999). The following are the major characteristic features of forest resources.
• About 80% of the total population depend on forests for fuelwood (WECS 1997). The fuel consumption for household and industrial biomass is estimated to be 15.4 million tonnes per year for 2000 compared to 11.3 million tonnes per year in 1985. Per capita fuelwood consumption in the Hills is estimated to be 640 kg, while it is 479 kg/person/yr for the Terai. The per capita timber consumption per annum was estimated at 0.07 m 3 /yr in 1985 and will increase to 0.11 m 3 /year by the year 2000. The timber demand at national level was projected to be about 2.5 million m 3 by the year 2000.
• Forest products contribute about 42% of the total digestible nutrients (TDN) of cattle. If the present conditions continue, the fodder supply for the TDN requirement will be in deficit by about 0.2 million tonnes by the year 2010 for the country as a whole (HMG/ADB/FINNIDA 1988).
• Between 1986 and 1999 about 0.155 million hectares of forest area were consumed by such uses as settlement, agriculture, institutional buildings, and roads (DFRD 1999). Thus, the per capita forest declined from 0.630 in 1964 to 0.442 in 1979 and further to 0.198 hectares in 1998.
• The forest area in the Terai region declined by 0.1 million hectares between the late 1950s and 1985 due to the planned resettlement programmes undertaken in the forest area. About an equal area of the forest was occupied illegally by migrants for settlement during the same period.
• The forest area has also declined due to continued extraction of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). Revenue through trade in NTFPs doubled from a current price of US$ 0.4 million in 1985 to US$ 0.8 million in 1997 (MoF 1999). Five out of over 100 plant species used in the trade include bojho (Acorus calamus), kutki (Picrorhiza kurroa), padamchal (Rheum emodi), chiraito (Swertia chirayita) and sugandawal (Valeriana wallichii).
• One striking feature of forest resource development undertaken recently is leasehold forest managed through users’ groups. In 1993, a total of 270 hectares of state-managed forest was handed over to user groups for leasehold forest and it was increased to over 1,100 hectares in 1996.
• Sustainable management and development of forests through involving communities as forest user groups is very important with regard to forest development in the country. In 1999, the government handed over a total of about 0.606 million hectares of state-owned forest to over 8,300 community forestry user groups for development, conservation, management, and sustainable use of the forests. A total of 0.929 million people is directly benefited by being members of user groups.
• Another feature of forest conservation is to manage the forest area in protected areas such as national parks, wildlife reserves, and conservation areas. Such protected areas have increased from 0.976 million hectares in 1984 to 2.476 million hectares in 1998.