Sustainable Forest Management policies and Indigenous people - a case study from India

The participation of Indigenous communities in forest management has become a crucial component of the global effort to achieve conservation goals. Indigenous peoples are globally recognized as agents of sustainability, as their unique knowledge, lifestyles, and skills provide practical solutions to many environmental issues faced worldwide. Several international agreements including the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) highlight the importance of Indigenous peoples' rights and emphasize the importance of Indigenous peoples' participation as key to achieving the SDGs' ambitions. However, establishing the basic rights of indigenous people for their traditional livelihood and involving all Indigenous communities in participatory management has proven challenging in a diverse country like India due to the complexity of its social and political landscape.

Through an extensive review of relevant literature, this study examines how the forest policy impacts Indigenous rights and livelihood, against the main international frameworks which acts as a guideline on the same. Further, through a case study based in the south of India, study analyses the intensity of participation of Indigenous people in the Joint Forest Management (JFM) programme and the factors influencing it, as well as its outcomes.

Our study reveals the mixed impact of forest policies on indigenous rights and livelihoods. While modern forest laws and policies are found to challenge traditional livelihoods, there has been a focused effort to establish indigenous rights within these policies. However, the reality on the ground regarding the implementation of these rights differs significantly from the published government statistics. Despite the emphasis placed on the importance of Indigenous participation in JFM policies, the level of involvement was found to be limited in the area studied. In the areas where there was indigenous participation in JFM, absolute decision-making authority and power-sharing were lacking. The sustainability of the JFM programme was found to be affected by challenges such as benefit sharing and NTFT collection. Guided by the results of the analysis and the perspectives of Indigenous peoples, the study proposes the active involvement of Indigenous peoples in forest management programmes, incorporating appropriate mechanisms to integrate their practices and knowledge, which could help in achieving the dual objectives of conservation and empowerment.