Sustainable Forest Management in Laos

Abstract

"Laos(Lao People's Democratic Republic) has the problem of deforestation and forest degradation. One of the reasons is on shifting cultivation in short term. The increasing of the population puts a pressure on an agricultural sector. Local people cannot help performing a shifting cultivation in short term, although they had traditionally done long term. This problem is similar with 'the tragedy of commons', suggested by G. Hardin (1968). The Lao's government implements the forestry policy, 'Land Forest Allocation Program'. This policy is to define clearly the boundary and classification of land inthe basis ofthe land-use of local communities. And, the main function of LFAP is to regard local community as forest manager and allow them to practice customary rights to utilize forest without a shifting cultivation in forestry law, that is, to adopt the approach for local community to participate in managing forest. This paper made clear that LFAP turns a shifting cultivation from sustainable method to unsustainable one.And, it made clear that community-governance plays a role as sustainable forest management in LFAP. First, it was turned that deforestation was related with the change in land-use in the basis ofstatistic data in LADA. Second, this problem is approached intermsof the Ostrom's theory, the analysis of economics. Third, on field survey in Louangphabang prefecture,it is turned that the system in village is consistence with the Ostrom's theory."