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Abstract:
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"Nepal is promoting community-based forest management approach known as community forestry as a promising option to fulfill the demands of basic forestry products and to reduce environmental degradation. Presently about 1.2 million hectares of forest is under the control of above 14 thousands forest user groups. Nepal's community forestry program is a classical example of successful decentralization in managing common pool resources. However, emerging evidence indicates that forest user groups are organizationally weak in governance and equitable management of resources. The community forestry groups tend not to have proportionate representation of poorer and disadvantaged households and women, poor fund allocation to women and poor related development activities, there is low awareness of policies and regulations, low advocacy capacity to claim their rights to natural resources resulting in little accountability or transparency in transactions, and a lack of predictability. This paper is based on the findings from six forest user groups implementing a program in 24 districts aimed at strengthening governance at the local level through increased womens participation and increased advocacy skills and capacity of selected civil society groups. The paper highlights the issue and policy influences process and outcomes at three levels namely local forest user group, sub- regional/district and national level. The activities implemented include advocacy training, workshops, media advocacy, constituency building through mobilizations of advocacy forum, issues based discussions, public auditing, budget analysis and exchange visits. The paper presents the process to improve governance and describe policy influences process and changes made. The findings suggest that there have been several arenas where policy influences have taken place as a result of advocacy. The findings note difference in funds allocated for social and community development activities, improved transparency in decision making, adoption of public auditing and public hearing, improvement of their internal governance capacity, formation of more inclusive structure of forest user groups committee to address the issues of poverty and social equity in Nepal."
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