Forest transition and socio-economic development in India and their implications for forest transition theory ☆

Published Date
Available online 11 November 2015, doi:10.1016/j.forpol.2015.10.013
In Press, Corrected Proof — Note to users

Author 

M.P. Singh ^a,,

P.P. Bhojvaid ^b

Wil de Jong ^c

J. Ashraf ^d

S.R. Reddy ^d

• aDirectorate of Forest Education, Dehradun 248006, India
• bDepartment of Forests, Haryana, India
• cCenter for Integrated Area Studies, Kyoto University, Japan
• dForest Research Institute, Dehradun 248006, India

Received 7 January 2015. Revised 26 October 2015. Accepted 28 October 2015. Available online 11 November 2015. 

Highlights

• •
  The contribution of economic development to forest transition gets obscured by the destruction of forests under colonial rule
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  Forest transition results from concurring deforestation, degradation, conservation, sustainable management, and afforestation
• •
  These factors contribute at different scales during different temporal phases of India's forest transition
• •
  Forest degradation continues post forest transition due to unregulated removal of wood and other forest products

Abstract

The paper provides a detailed analysis of forest transition in India, exploring the direct and underlying causes and factors that explain deforestation and forest degradation, decline in deforestation and forest degradation, and forest recovery. The paper reviews these causes and factors during the periods before India experienced forest transition and after it experienced forest transition, which happened during the 1980s. Causes and forces that caused deforestation and forest degradation were forest exploitation for timber, an increased population that sought agricultural land, economic modernization through expansion of agricultural production, forest dependence and related forest exploitation, and even forest conversion when forest land became notified and thus forest owners lost rights to derive benefits from forests. Causes and factors that reduced deforestation and forest degradation and resulted in forest recovery, included agricultural intensification, government policies, private tree and forest production and smallholder and community forestry. Multiple forest transition pathways can be signaled as having contributed to forest transition pathways in India. The case of India actually question to what extent the forest transition pathway concept is valid for contemporary forest transition in complex countries like India.

Keywords

Forest transition

Stages of development

Transition pathways

Sustainable management of forests

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• ☆
  This article belongs to the special issue: Forest Transition in Asia.

• ⁎ 
  Corresponding author.

© 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.

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