Skip to main content

Seminar on Community Forests for Poverty reduction


Mr. Karma Dukpa, Director of DoFPS with the participants

The Community Forests (CFs) Programme of the Department of Forests and Park Services (DoFPS) has potential for contributing towards national efforts of poverty reduction. This is because, such programme besides encouraging participatory management of forests and natural resources provides avenues for deriving economic benefits. Such economic benefits can have direct bearing on bringing down poverty incidences. With its reach currently confined to rural areas, it is also in sync with the poverty which is predominantly a rural phenomenon.
However, after having almost 305 Community Forests incepted in Bhutan involving 35,993 rural households covering forest area of 40,329 hectares, the need was felt to timely assess its impact on poverty reduction. Towards this, the Chief Forestry Officers (CFOs) of field divisions, Park Managers (PMs) and Dzongkhag Forestry Officers (DzFOs) gathered at Bumthang attending “Seminar on Community Forests for Poverty’.
During the seminar, the plenary and presentations were made by the officials and researchers within and outside DoFPS. The international, regional and fields experiences encompassing all components of CFs with its relevance to poverty reduction were shared at the seminar in addition to case studies. The members of the CFs and Non-wood Forests Product Management Group also shared their substantial hands-on experiences.
Moreover, the seminar also enabled different stakeholders of CF development in the Country to delve into constraints and issues confronting them and accordingly resolve it. If there were any ‘stumbling blocks’ in the smooth flow of CF programme, things were smoothed during the two-day seminar. The seminar also saw many deliberations all of which borne a fruitful results.
The seminar co-hosted by Social Forestry Division (SFD) with Ugyen Wangchuck Institute of Conservation and Environment (UWICE) will publish the proceedings and issue to all relevant stakeholders.
The Director of DoFPS, Mr. Karma Dukpa chaired the 2-day seminar and was attended by many other officials.
The funding for the seminar was provided by Royal Government of Bhutan and Participatory Forest Management Project (PFMP), Helvetas.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Long, long, long journey to Education

“Root of the education is bitter but the fruit is sweet” no one would know about it better than Kado. The fatigue of having to toddle to the school, fever of unending exams, the torture of having to burn the midnight oil, dozing in classes and the stern rigors are hard to endure, few even give up on the way but many endure it with utmost determination and commitment, because deep inside everyone knows it pays later. “Root of the education is bitter but the fruit is sweet” no one would know about it better than Kado Kado in the tender age of 12 is negotiating the lazily meandering footpath along the steep mountain. His school bag, full of books, pulls him back. His black naughty boy school shoe is all soiled, indication of how many times he has trudged that same footpath. He is on his way to the primary school in his village, almost 5 kilometers away. He has to make sure he is in the school before morning social work starts; else he gets penalized. Unlike the students who reside nearb...
Post a Comment
Read more

Defining Tsa-Wa-Sum in One’s own Perspective

If I am asked, I would boldly answer, “The Tsa-Wa-Sum is “Gyeb, Gyelkhab and Meser”, (King, Country and People). But not everyone knows about what tsa-wa-sum is. Hence, when the superior ask them, they are left to conceive their own tsa-wa-sum. Once a meeting was convened by the Dzongdag. In a large congregation of illiterate rural people, the Dzongdag thundered, “do you know what tsa-wa-sum is?” “Can anyone from the crowd tell me?” The crowd went to pin drop silence and no one seems ready to answer. Are they scared of Dasho or no one has the slightest idea what it is? Suddenly, a Ngalop man sitting in the last bench, for whom Dasho is hardly visible, stood up. With his head bowed low, he answers, “The three tsa-wa-sum are Ngalops, Sharchops and Lhotsampas”. “This is because they are the three race in Bhutan” Dasho went into bout of annoyance but before he fired the man, another Lhotsampa (Southern Bhutanese Man) supplemented, “the three tsa-wa-sum are Royal Bhutan Army (RBA) Royal B...
1 comment
Read more

Eternal Enemies

The Cats and Dogs are often adopted by the people in the metropolitan as pets. They go pretty good as pets since they are known to be endearing animals. Some set of folks have their paramount love and passion for these animals. But back in the village, these two creatures are mainly spared space in the home to shoulder their own responsibilities. For instance, the cat is entrusted with the job of dwindling or keeping at the sea bed, the number of rats referred to as naughty rodents in the village. And the dog cannot keep eating what the owner provides and sleep. At night, they have to escort the owners into the corn field and keep barking to keep away, the lurking night’s ambusher (deer, bears, porcupine, and wild pig etcetera). So, I see no overlapping of their right to food and duties. But, many might have surely taken the notice of these two four legged animal never tolerating each other’s presence. One fine day they meet but await a big confrontation. The sight of one another inv...
2 comments
Read more