Legal and Policy Issues of Non-wood Forest Products (NWFPs) for Sustainable Conservation and Livelihoods: A Global Perspective

Abstract

Forests and the associated biological resources have historically played a crucial role in ensuring environmental conservationGovernance, Conservation and sustaining livelihood especially for the forest dependent rural and Indigenous communities across the globe. Notwithstanding the growing recognition of non-wood forest products (NWFPs) in supporting local livelihood and contributing to environmental conservationGovernance, Conservation, the legal and policy dimensions of NWFPs have received relatively less attention from both the academic and practicing quarters. In this backdrop, this article provides a critical overview of selected aspects and issues of NWFPs with special relations to the implications for community livelihood and conservation. After setting the scene in the introductory section, the second section summarizes the context and current status of the relevant key legal and policy instruments that globally implicate NWFPs and their propagation and utilizationUtilization. The third section then identifies the important desired features (notably, financial incentivesFinancial incentives and exemption of taxes to promote NWFPs; secure tenural arrangements) of a ‘supportive policy’ that can facilitate community development and their sustainable livelihood based on NWFPs and related activities. In conclusion, the major challenges and problems are briefly recapitulated. Based on the overall observations and analyses, several recommendations are also made including the following: creating enabling conditions for the conservationGovernance, Conservation and sustainable management of NWFPs; promoting wider stakeholder participation and ‘co-creation’ mechanism in the formulation and execution of the relevant policies; supporting a stable institutional framework (at the country level) with adequate technical and financial capacity; ensuring cross sectoral interaction and coordination; exploring indigenous knowledge and local practices.