The interests and needs of forest communities must be integrated into forestry development activities
A case in point is the Agroforestry Outreach Project (AOP) in Haiti, which incorporated detailed social analysis in the design. The project was based on the premise that farmer motivation is a function of the realistic expectation of a reasonable economic return in the relatively near term. The basic aim of the project has been to promote the planting and maintenance of substantial numbers of hardwood seedlings that are drought resistant and also good for charcoal and basic construction needs. These have been planted by individual farmers on their own land as an economically viable crop which they have the right to harvest in the same fashion as maize, millet, sugar cane and other crops (Murray, 1987).
By the end of 1989, after eight years of implementation, the AOP had produced and distributed more than 50 million trees to 20000 peasants, 30 percent of whom were planting for the second time. Some 40 percent of the trees survived out planting. In addition, the AOP carried out a comprehensive programme of soil conservation in which live vegetative barriers, litter terraces and gully plugs were promoted and monitored. Some I million m (linear) of hedgerows helped stabilize soil on the hillsides. There were also demonstration gardens where soil conservation, agroforestry and intensive gardening techniques were applied on a pilot basis (Gow, 1990).
During this period, certain significant changes were made in response to changing local conditions and needs. Although payment of incentives to the farmers was envisaged in the original design, after the first year this payment was found to be unnecessary and was eliminated. A second major change was in the modest assumptions that had been made about peasant motivation for planting trees. The project designers had assumed that the farmers would want to plant the trees primarily for charcoal production, but the analysis revealed that a primary motivation, for some, was to improve soil conditions. Others were using them as key elements in an effort to transform on-farm production: for example, deploying project trees to establish or re-establish coffee groves on land that might otherwise never have been put to this relatively sustainable use. Still others were using project trees as an alternative strategy for dealing with relative and absolute labour shortages within the production unit (Conway, 1986). As a result, the project diversified its technical activities and also the species it made available to the farmers.
One of the underlying social objectives of development projects should be to ensure a more equitable access to development resources. Distribution of the ensuing benefits and the impact of project in this regard should also be analysed. Care must be taken to distinguish between the various groups indigenous people, settlers and migrants, the very poor and those outside the forest who are dependent on its resources, etc. and their differing priorities and needs.
For example, the Forest Protection Committees of West Bengal, India, provide specific villages with preferential rights to certain tracts of degraded forest. The user groups, often composed of both male and female villagers from tribal communities, take on more of the protection and control of harvesting in return for a substantially greater share of the eventual proceeds from the resource. Current sharing arrangements for major forest products are based on an equal division of benefits among members. However, initial sacrifices in the form of income lost in cash and kind are heaviest among disadvantaged groups. The Forest Department has attempted to compensate by providing employment opportunities while the new production system matures. In addition, the multiple products from the regenerated forests are exploited on a continuing or seasonal basis by women (Poffenberger, 1990).