Why do local households harvest forest products? A case study from the southern Western Ghats, India

Deforestation in tropical countries has been partly attributed to the non-sustainable harvesting of forest biomass by local communities. We conducted a survey among 786 households in 31 agricultural villages adjoining the eastern boundary of the Kalakad-Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve, in the southern Western Ghats to see whether household wealth, social status, literacy and distance to the forest boundary influenced resource harvesting. Fuel-wood, fodder and green leaves were the major products harvested in this agricultural region. The effect of distance from the reserve boundary differed with the product harvested and its use value. Distance was a constraint for households that harvested for domestic consumption, whereas it was not significant for households that harvested for earnings. Wealth was independent of resource interest in the forest, except for the poorer lower caste households with lower levels of literacy that sold fuel-wood to earn a living. Wealthier households harvested green leaves for fertilizing their fields, and fodder harvest was related to livestock ownership. The lower cost of forest products compared to commercially available substitutes probably fuelled extraction. Forest products contributed disproportionately to household consumption as compared with household earnings. Discouraging the harvest of forest products within protected areas might be the only viable conservation strategy. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.