| Nepal has been facing insurmountable problems of deforestation and land degradation since late 1960s, as a result of heavy dependency of rural population on forests for sustenance. As a solution, a participatory, user-empowered forest resource management policy was envisioned in 1978 in the form of Community Forestry (CF).; The success of the CF policy has now progressed beyond forest protection and rehabilitation towards a sustainable utilization focus. In this study, three social strata of forest users—elite, women, and disadvantaged—from eight community forests of Dhading district are surveyed to assess their perceptions on CF processes and impacts.; The study revealed that CF has had pronounced positive impacts on the forest environment, goods and services, and local development. However, some social groups perceive differential participation in certain processes and inequitable sharing of CF benefits. User identification, forest boundary, and forest product distribution are still the conflicting issues among the users.; A transparent decision-making and equitable benefit-sharing procedures are essential among forest user groups to sustain community forestry's successes and to have greater livelihood impacts on forest dependent communities in Nepal. |
