Over three-fourth of the land area in the district has a forest cover,
albeit depleting gradually over the years. A major cause of forest depletion is
attributed to the harvest of forest produce that is available free of cost. Though there is a legal classification on what makes up a forest and a clamp-down on harvest from reserved forests, most of the forest land is treated as common property resource.
This unlimited and free access to forest resources, coupled with increase in population and lack of awareness has caused a Tragedy of Commons in the district.
People depend on forests for fuel wood, green leaves, dry leaves, structural material (small timber) and many other non-timber forest products (NTFPs). While harvesting some of these products like fuel wood and leafy materials leads to partial loss of biomass, harvesting of structural material mostly leads to a complete loss of biomass.
Farmers fence their agricultural fields almost every year with structural material harvested from forests in order to protect their crop from wild animals and cattle. Owing to heavy monsoon, material used for fencing decomposes and the fields need fencing the next year.
The ideal structural material for villagers would be plants of the girth (circumference) of 10-20 cm. While some farmers harvest bamboo and branches of trees for fencing, there are others who just chop young trees. They end up chopping future trees to meet present needs.
It is a similar scenario at Nidgod, a small village in Siddapur taluk of Uttara Kannada district with a geographical area of 814.48 hectares inhabited by 651 people. Most people here rely heavily on forests. People with land depend on the forest for biomass requirement of their crop and landless labourers rely on forests for supplying biomass from forests to land owners.
Reduction of biomass
Nidgod has a reserve forest to which there is no access to people, legally speaking. Minor forest to which there is limited access and soppina bettas are used by arecanut growers to meet biomass requirement. Many years of harvesting from all this forest has resulted in reduction of biomass, tree density and species density.
Disturbance to the forest biodiversity caused by way of cutting, lopping and chopping is very high. Loss of forest cover near the village has resulted in an increase in the distance that residents of Nidgod have had to travel to collect forest produce. This seems to be ringing alarm bells for the villagers. People have started to shift to fuel-efficient stoves and live fencing technique to avoid chopping trees.
Live fencing to save trees
A study of 80 (53 per cent of total) households in Nidgod showed that 39 per cent of them have already taken up the live-fencing technique and have planted grilicidia maculata.
This has meant saving of 10.02 tonnes of structural material per year. As compared to the earlier harvest, there is a 46 per cent saving of structural material. As G.maculata is a fast growing leguminous tree, it can be harvested a few times a year for foliage. Therefore, there is also a possibility of reducing lopping of green leaves from natural forests.
Though some of the villagers have realised the benefits of live-fencing, a huge chunk of the population is yet to realise it. Though the reasons for this major part of the population to persist with the traditional fencing method is unclear, it seems that they are unaware of how much damage they are causing to forests.
Today, after much degradation of the forest, people of Nidgod are realising the importance of conserving trees. It is important to create awareness among people about the cost saved in terms of labour hours because fuel-efficient stoves require less fuelwood.
Also, they need to be made aware of the fact that G.maculata once planted lives for many years. This has to be done with the joint effort of Forest Department and local NGOs as they are in close contact with the village community.
Courtesy Deccan Herald
