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PRINT ISSN : 2319-7692
Online ISSN : 2319-7706 Issues : 12 per year Publisher : Excellent Publishers Email : editorijcmas@gmail.com / submit@ijcmas.com Editor-in-chief: Dr.M.Prakash Index Copernicus ICV 2018: 95.39 NAAS RATING 2020: 5.38 |
Joint Forest Management (JFM) is an approach and programme initiated in the context of the National Forest Policy (1988), wherein the state forest department supports local forest dwellers to protect and manage forests and shares the costs and benefits from the forests with them. The present investigation was carried out in Uttara Kannada district to examine the constraints faced by the JFM members in forest management and collection of NTFPs. The sample size comprised of 232 JFM members who were selected by proportionate stratified random sampling technique. Data was collected with structured interview schedule through personal interview and focus group discussion. The findings revealed that major constraints of JFM members in forest management activities were: overlapping of agricultural and JFM activities, non-availability of regular work, non-uniformity in fixing the financial grants for different VFCs (Sukthanidhi) and lack of emphasis on quick economic activities. The constraints as perceived by JFM members in NTFP collection were: lack of marketing facilities, absence of fixed price for NTFPs and lack of processing units. The constraints expressed by the forest department officials in implementing the JFM activities were committee members not attending meeting, desire of forest dwellers for immediate benefits, lack of staff and procedural delays of the department in implementing the programme.