Content uploaded by Mark Poffenberger
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Mark Poffenberger on Apr 27, 2015
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
Communities and Forest Management in South Asia
Abstract
This book provides a brief overview of the role of communities in forest management in five South Asia nations, including India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. The volume has short sections on history, ecology, and policy together with case studies from each country.
... Dominant tree species across CHT includes: Champa (Michelia champaca), Chapalish (Artocarpus chama), Chickrassi (Chickrassia velutina), (Khan, 2008). Historically, the CHT was inhabited by diverse local ethnic groups, (Poffenberger, 2000). As a result, nearly 100,000 ethnic peoples were displaced from their ancestral homes and lands. ...
Bangladesh government has recently pledged to restore 0.75 million hectares of degraded forest-land as part of its commitment to the Bonn challenge, however little is known about the potential challenges and opportunities towards achieving that goal. Using secondary literature complemented by expert consultation and a field survey, we examined the outcomes and limitations of the past restoration programs and identified key social, ecological and institutional aspects crucial for a successful forest restoration program in Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh. The region accounts for over one-third of state-owned forests and supports a large part of country's forest-dwelling ethnic populations, but most forestlands are severely degraded. Our analyses revealed that past programs utilized participatory tree planting, horticulture and rubber-based agroforestry to restore degraded forestland and improve community livelihood in the CHT. However, past restoration programs merely emphasized improving tree cover without considering ecological functionality, biodiversity and carbon co-benefits of restored forests. The duration of those programs was also relatively short, without any clear plan for engaging local communities in restoration activities beyond the program period. Among others, the local ethnic community's land rights issue remains unresolved and the participant's land ownership influenced their willingness to participate effectively in restoration programs. Households with secured land rights had a more positive attitude towards participating in forestland restoration than those with unsecured land rights. Suitable acts and policies that may allow people to legally continue tree-based land use in the regions (i.e., forest and land tenure rights) are also lacking. Future forest and landscape restoration (FLR) programs may thus need to focus on improving restored forests' biodiversity and ecological functionality, resolving the local people's forest and land tenure rights, and involving them with site-specific restoration interventions. The engagement of local and regional level multiple stakeholders in an FLR program is also essential for realizing the restoration's multiple social and ecological benefits.
... Being the most densely populated country (among countries with ≥10 million people), there is always a high demand for the limited resources, which is causing rapid habitat clearance, and natural resource extraction is a crucial economic activity (Chowdhury et al., 2021b;Chowdhury et al., 2021f;Mukul et al., 2008;Watson et al., 2014;Geldmann et al., 2019). Only about 11 % of the original forest cover in Bangladesh remains, and deforestation is continuing rapidly (Chowdhury et al., 2021b;Mukul and Quazi, 2009;Poffenberger, 2000). About 62 % of 305 butterflies found in Bangladesh are now threatened with local extinction (IUCN Bangladesh, 2015). ...
Climate change is a major threat impacting insects globally, yet the impact on tropical insects is largely unknown. Here, I assessed the climatic vulnerability of Bangladeshi butterflies (242 species). About 42 % of species could experience range contraction, and the impact could be significantly more severe among threatened species. Depending on Socio-Economic Pathways (ssps), the future climatic condition could be unsuitable for 2 (ssp126) – 34 % (ssp585) species. The mean elevation of the suitable habitat could increase by 238 %, and the situation could be more severe for the threatened butterflies. Further, 54 % of the realised niche of butterflies could be altered. Although there might be no significant association between the shift in habitat suitability along the elevational gradient, migratory species could experience a more significant shift than non-migrants. Overall, climate change could have a severe impact on Bangladeshi butterflies. To mitigate insect decline globally and meet the Post 2020 Biodiversity Framework targets, immediate detection of climate change impact on tropical insects and developing effective conservation strategies is essential.
... for India; 6.58% in Myanmar; UNEP-WCMC, 2020). Only about 11% of the original forest cover in Bangladesh remains, and deforestation is continuing rapidly (Poffenberger, 2000;Mukul and Quazi, 2009 better known than many other insect groups, albeit less than vertebrates, and (iii) the only insect group that has been assessed in the most recent national threatened species assessment. Here, we collate occurrence records of Bangladeshi butterflies from a range of sources to (i) estimate the distribution of each species across the country, and (ii) calculate protected area coverage for each species, identifying any shortfalls in coverage. ...
Understanding which species migrate and why is critical to elucidating their ecology and planning for their conservation yet studying migration in insects is complicated by their small size and the difficulty of tracking individuals over long distances. In my PhD, I studied the movement patterns of butterflies and assessed global progress in insect conservation.
First, I conducted a comprehensive literature review, and discovered that at least 568 butterfly species show evidence of migratory movements. This suggests migration is much more widespread among butterflies than previously realised; indeed, the rate of ‘discovery’ of migratory movements in butterflies suggests that thousands of species are migratory.
The geographic distribution of butterfly migration is poorly understood. I built ecological niche models to describe and further investigate migration in migratory butterflies. I discovered strong seasonal variation in habitat suitability for most species, and the greatest rate of apparent migration occurs in the tropics. Several species showed extreme seasonal fluctuations in their distribution, and such species may be at elevated extinction risk.
Our climate is changing, including directional changes in temperature, rainfall, and timings of seasonal transitions. We might expect to see changes in migratory behaviour as a consequence. I studied the range expansion of the tawny coster butterfly. I discovered that its climatic niche differs only slightly during its colonisation of Australasia, consistent with changing conditions driving its changed distribution. The species has expanded its range in Australia at an impressive average rate of ~ 135 km/year.
Protected areas have been established around the world to preserve samples of biodiversity from pressing threats, yet the adequacy of protected area systems in many tropical nations is poorly understood. I assessed the extent to which butterflies are covered by protected areas in a mega-populated country, Bangladesh. Using three different methods to map species distributions, I found that the current protected area distribution in Bangladesh is inadequate for conserving butterflies, with <1.5% of butterflies’ geographic range being covered by protected areas.
Most assessments of protected area performance focus on vertebrates, and the effectiveness and performance of protected areas for conserving insects is mostly unknown. There is no large-scale assessment of whether the world’s protected areas are adequate for conserving insects, nor whether these areas remain effective under climate change scenarios. I conducted the first ever assessment of the extent to which insects are represented in the global network of protected areas. Measuring geographic range in two different ways, I discovered that more than 75% of insects are inadequately conserved in protected areas.
Overall, the work has helped improve our understanding of the prevalence and characteristics of migration in insects and highlight some of the major shortfalls in global conservation efforts for insects in a changing world.
... These local and indigenous communities support relevant models of caring species richness of national parks (McNeely, 1994) as well as biodiversity conservation perspectives (Bennett & Dearden, 2014a). The achievement of national park biodiversity management through local people's (MacKinnon et al., 1986) participation enhances in desired condition (Ali and Habib, 1998) as well as establishing co-management (Poffenberger, 2000). However, collaborative management is integrated with local people (MEA, 2005), indigenous people, elite leader, local government leader, decision-maker and administrative body for national park's biodiversity management. ...
The explorative field observation on Environmental Conservation Psychology (ECP) is multi-diversified with collective and conjectural outlook. ECP provides a better understanding of the way in which conservation awareness, attitude, ethics, culture and well-being are affected by physical environments, social settings and built-in environment. The goal is to stimulate more attention be paid to ensure the effectiveness of environmental conservation and highlight psychological instruments required to develop new interdisciplinary approaches with innovative ways in prevailing challenges for the present and upcoming generations. Primary data were collected from a sample of respondents at the Lawachara National Park (LNP) in Moulvibazar district of Bangladesh and secondary data were obtained from diverse sources. The research denoted and investigated by various disciplines and fields including environmental behaviors studies, positive psychology, person-environment studies, human-nature science and ecological psychology. The study showed about 70% of indigenous respondents opined on positive attitudes for environmental conservation to compare with 55% in others. The study identified approximately 65% of respondents stated for development of environmental education among local communities for promoting positive psychology surrounding the national park. This study focuses the importance of understanding this multidimensional psychological research as it is to inform about the environmental conservation perspectives that have contributed to and shaped the learning with high internal conservation stability, dependability, uniformity, and attractiveness with social bonding at LNP. This study represents the environmental design, manage, protect and restore conserving of biodiversity towards national parks that influence human behavior, predict and the likely outcomes when these conditions are not met and diagnose problem situations. This study links at solving complex environmental conservation problems in the pursuit of individual well-being within a longer community through human-environment conservation interactions.
... The success of management depends on the degree of support and respect awarded to the protected area by neighboring communities (MacKinnon, 1986). While there is a growing consensus that indigenous community participation in protected area management is needed and desirable (Ali and Habib, 1998), opinions regarding how to establish collaborative Management and what form it should take remain at odds (Poffenberger, 2000). It is difficult to involve the local and indigenous communities in protected area management without giving them any benefit or providing them with alternate source of income that are dependent on protected areas for their sustenance. ...
Asia is the most populous region, with a substantial number of global biodiversity hotspots and several megadiverse countries, including Malaysia, with rich cultural and natural heritages. In this region, natural heritages within protected areas is under threat with high tendency of biodiversity losses. Exploitation is widespread but effective conservation is hampered by lack of systematically dynamic policies and instruments. This study attempts to relook at key factors that strengthen policies towards conserving biodiversity at national parks (NPs) in Bangladesh and Sarawak, Malaysia. It focuses on the analysis and review of the present tools (policy, growth of national parks and legal aspects) used to enhance conservation activities within and around these areas through literature review, observations of some of the parks, as well as interviews with relevant staff and indigenous community. The study showed that the growth of NPs maximized for the period of 2010 to 2014 both in Bangladesh and Sarawak, Malaysia reflecting the importance that both countries are placing on the conservation of biodiversity and the ecosystem services they provide. This is indeed a positive sign that both two countries reveal towards achieving Aichi Biodiversity Target 11 for the global protected areas network. Overall, the study suggests that the dynamic policy-based decision-making on sustainable biodiversity protection at NPs in both countries should incorporate development with environmental, economic, social, institutional and administrative domains.
With a view to creating an inventory of the existing climatic and nutritional condition of the haor (low-lying land) areas along with their cropping systems, this research was carried out in the Dingaputa haor of the Netrakona district of Bangladesh. The main objective was to study the farmers’ concept of climate change issues and their responses in respect to cropping systems and nutrition. This study is crucial for comparing the existing situation and taking future decisions. The feasibility and strategic direction of the present haor agriculture were evaluated using strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis and matrices. The results showed that the farmers’ understanding of climate change was much lower than expected; a maximum of 73.2% farmers pointed out that climate change means frequent flooding, and more than 90% of farmers opined that temperature, early flooding, and lightning have increased over time. They strongly agreed that boro (dry-season-irrigated) rice is affected more frequently by natural hazards than in previous times. Very few farmers (only 14.4%) have taken adaptation strategies, which are less climate-smart and nutrition-sensitive. Only 10.8% of farmers cultivated oilseeds, pulses, and vegetables other than boro rice. A lack of technological knowledge is the main obstacle to practicing climate-resilient, modern cultivation practices. The trends of cultivation and consumption of vegetables by haor farmers are very low, whereas they are agreeable to cultivating nutrition-sensitive and high-value crops if they have technical support. The major strengths of haor agriculture are fertile soil and rice surplus, whereas weaknesses are monocropping and malnutrition.
Mikania micrantha, commonly known as mile-a-minute, is one of the problematic invasive species confined in low lands of Nepal, particularly, in and around Chitwan National Park. This study assessed the alteration caused by Mikania micrantha on regeneration diversity, density and biological (carbon) sequestration in Kumrose Buffer zone forest. Equal numbers of sampling plots were taken in each forest block invaded and non-invaded by Mikania micrantha. The regeneration status was estimated through density and Shannon diversity indices whereas, soil organic carbon and biomass carbon stock were determined, analyzed and compared with available standard methodologies. The regeneration density and diversity were significantly higher in the non-invaded forest. Regeneration of major desirable forest species viz. Dalbergia sissoo, Acacia catechu and Bombax ceiba were recorded in the noninvaded forest whereas regeneration of these species was absent in invaded forest. Higher regeneration diversity and density in the non-invaded forest (Shannon diversity index was 1.42) shows better forest conditions for the growth and development of tree species than in the invaded forest. Similarly, total carbon stock was 1.14 times higher in non-invaded forests indicating that Mikania micrantha can dramatically alter carbon sequestration. Though total carbon stock was higher in non-invaded forests, soil and undergrowth carbon stock was higher in the invaded forest. Overall findings demonstrate that Mikania micrantha can alter both forest regeneration and carbon storage ability of the forest. The study highly recommends to concern authorities control the further invasion of this species to conserve the rich riverine forest ecosystem.
This article discusses Costa Rica’s policies and institutions created by the state to redistribute land during the 1960s and 1970s, when Latin American was implementing agrarian reforms. The paper also addresses the creation of the national parks system and forest conservation state policy supported by different scientific organisations during the same period. Within this context, this research seeks to explore the interface between the agrarian question (surrounding land and agrarian reform) and the ecological question (related to forest, national parks and conservation policies). The study examines how the transformations in land tenure and forest conservation have led to the structuring of a ‘new agrarian question’, which encompasses the concentration of land as well as the concentration of payments for environmental services.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.