Challenges of agro and private forestry and opportunities
-Shyam Bhandari and Rupa Chapagain
Agroforestry is not a new practice in Nepal. Growing tree crops and rearing livestock along with agricultural crops is the traditional livelihood system of Nepali farmers.
It is the main source of livelihood for majority of the people and a strong pillar for country’s economy as well. More than 60% people directly rely on agriculture for their livelihoods and agriculture is contributing around a quarter of proportion in gross domestic product (GDP).
Yeah! You heard it right, Nepal is agriculture based economy, however, shockingly Nepal has imported food and food related products worth Rs. 220 Billion in last fiscal year. Agriculture profession is in decline since last few decades and people going for foreign employment has significantly increased. It has been estimated that around 5 million youths are working in various countries including India. Remittance has surpassed the agriculture in GDP contribution.
Around a third of Nepal’s agriculture land has been left barren. Migration, opportunity cost of land, decreasing land ownership, scarcity of local labor and people’s interest on change of profession are the main causes behind this.
Despite of having 21% agricultural land and 45% forest area, the products from agriculture and forest are not sufficient meeting the demand of country’s population.
In last two fiscal years, the import of wood has soared to Rs 6.61 and 5.01 billion respectively, according to Department of Customs. But, the Federation of Forest based Industry and Trade (FenFIT) Nepal has different claim than the Government statistics. It claims that around 15-20 billion of timber and timber related materials is being imported annually. Don’t you think this is a big shame on us?
Nepal is a natural resource rich country. Having said that, there are myriad of opportunities and great potential to uplift the country’s economy through agriculture and forest. One estimate says that around 350 million cft timber can be produced annually from the improved management of the forest while another estimates says that at least 100 million cft can be produced annually from improved forest management from productive Terai Forest.
The demand of the wood in Nepal is around 30 million cubic feet (cft) while domestic production is around 20 million cft only. As of current situation, the proportion of wood production from private or family forest is more than 70% of total domestic production. Whoa, that’s a huge proportion but where is government’s priorities and policies for agro-forestry and family forestry?
Numerous challenges in Agroforestry and Private Forestry
There have been numerous challenges that hindered the development of agroforestry and private forestry. Firstly, there was no any institutional mechanism and focused planning and budgeting due to unclear jurisdiction but now it falls under the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development.
Secondly, legal hassles in registration, tree harvest, trade and transportation was one of the major problem which is still existing though some progress is achieved.
Thirdly, the problems lie in technical aspects. Lack in extension of technical services, availability of quality seedlings, farmers lacking technical knowledge and skills regarding growing and measurements of trees and suitable combination with agriculture crops are the major obstacle in this domain.
Fourthly, administrative weakness or judgmental Government Officers those who define the legal provisions to their own comfort or for corruption purpose. They delay the administrative process or suppress the farmers in the name of process and documentation.
Fifthly, farmers have no direct access to market and lack of marketing knowledge make them difficult to sell it in competitive price.
Sixthly, financial problems such as lack of: financial incentives, easy loan and discounted interest rates, acceptance of forest product as collateral and insurance facilities do not support the expected growth of agroforestry and family forestry sectors.
Lacking Policies in Past
Master Plan for Forestry Sector (MPFS), 1988 has envisioned the private forestry as a major pillar of forestry sector and target to develop more than 30 million hectares of private forestby the end of 21 years. Unfortunately, at the end of this plan, there were no more than 2500 private forestry registered with a scant 3000 hectares of land.
Forest Act 1993 and Forest Regulation1995 and Revised Forest Sector Policy, 2000 also failed to help flourish the private forest. Likewise, agriculture policy also could not address the agro-forestry properly.
All policies and strategies such as Climate Change Policy 2011, Agriculture Development Strategy 2014, Biodiversity Conservation Strategy and Action Plan 2014-20, Forest Sector Strategy 2016-25 and Forest Policy 2015 had targeted to promote agroforestry as well as private forestry. But, due to lack of institutional mechanism and inadequate planning, the growth of agroforestry and private forestry sector has been stunted.
Renewed hope in Federal Nepal
We can be a bit hopeful as Nepal has ushered into federal system decentralizing its governance modality. Current National Climate Change Policy 2019, National Agroforestry Policy 2019 and National Forest Policy 2019 has prioritised the agroforestry and family forestry as a means to achieve prosperity through livelihood improvement, contribution to national economy and building climate resilience.
National Forest Policy 2019 has first time ever recognized the family forest as one of the major regime of forest governance model in Nepal. It has provisioned the loan for private and family forest, technical support and capacity building of forest farmers as well as empowered the Local Government to promote family forest and related enterprise.
It promotes the agroforestry through leasehold forestry program and allows free harvest and trade of trees grown in private land. National Climate Change Policy 2019 also promotes the agroforestry through multipurpose tree plantation in underutilized agricultural land, hill slope, degraded forest land and river bed.
Similarly, 15th National Plan has made provisions to support the plantation in private land, business plan preparation of private/family forest, financial incentives, easy loan with discounted interest rate, insurance and green collateral, promotes plantation of high value agriculture and tree crops in unused farm land. Moreover, Prime Minister Agriculture Modernization Program has been piloting the intensive agroforestry program in each districts (Jhapa, Bara, Kavre, Kaski, Dang, Jumla and Kailali) of all seven provinces.
In past, agroforestry was mentioned in around 30 policies, laws and plans. However, no one policy, law or plan has given importance to agroforestry. There was no clear jurisdiction to promote and develop agroforestry programs. Now, with the National Agroforestry Policy 2019, Agriculture and Livestock Development Ministry is accountable to work in this sector. It has envisioned the agroforestry as a basis of prosperity.
It has objectives to promote intensive agroforestry to improve food security and livelihood, increase employment and income generating opportunities through commercialization, increased research and capacity building of stakeholders. The policy has assured to provide the needed support such as technical backstopping, loan, tree as collateral, irrigation, seed and seedlings, fertilizer, tools and equipment, support grant, technology transfer, and marketing of products.
It has made provisions to experiment and recommend the suitable agroforestry model and species for suitable geographic region and places. The local levels devoid of forest can make special programs and prioritize agroforestry and private forestry development program. It also assures to ease the harvest, trade and transportation of agroforestry products.
It recommends the cereal and oil crops and lentils in Terai, trees in Chure, fruit species in mid-hills, non-timber and medicinal plants in high hill and mountains, fish farming in places having water bodies and livestock rearing in uncultivable land.
In short, new policy on agroforestry is very favorable but still legal basis has to be formulated and implementation part should be strong. Many of the policies and laws are still in the process of formulation at federal, provincial and local level. Hence, it is very right time to make progressive laws that could promote agroforestry and family forestry for achieving the national vision of “Happy Nepali: Prosperous Nepal.”
Increased relevance due to COVID-19
The global economy has gone down due to COVID-19. The World Bank has projected economic de-growth by more than 5% this year. Nepal is also hard hit by this global recession as it is much dependent on remittance.
The food security of our country is at high risk because of high dependency on food products import. Nepal is at 79th position out of 113 countries prepared by Global Food Index in 2019 and 73rd position out of 117 countries in Global Hunger Index in 2019. Recent National study also shows that almost one quarter people in Nepal are at affected by food insecurity. In other hand, the income source of majority of Nepali is lost due to loss of employment in foreign labor market.
Around, one million youths have returned to Nepal from India and other countries. More are expected to come if recession continues. This has increased the unemployment rates in Nepal. So, it is right time to engage youth in agroforestry and private forestry profession and utilize the barren and underutilized land to increase productivity.
This will not only increase employment but will also increase food production, timber production and sustain our economy in long run. For this, we need to have favorable policies and programs as well as address the aforementioned problems.
(Mr. Bhandari and Ms.Chapagain are forestry professionals and independent blog writers.)