Advisor(s)
Abstract(s)
In the last five decades, Community-Based Forestry (CBF) has
become a subject of special attention. It is assumed that the transfer
of rights to local communities will improve forest management. In
Portugal more than 13% of the forest area belongs to local communities
(termed baldios). Following FAO tools, assessments of
Forest Tenure and CBF were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness
of four baldio management types. The results revealed the most
common challenges for baldios, vis- a-vis, rights associated with their
management, protection of these rights, weak land administration,
weak mechanisms for conflict resolution, problems with decentralized
state support, cash flow management, and environmental challenges
leading to wildfires, loss of biodiversity, and inadequate
control of pests and invasive species. Resolution of these challenges
is urgently needed at the legal, administrative and local levels.
Future research should include assessments of CBF in other
European countries to reduce the existing knowledge gap.
Description
Keywords
Baldios Community lands Forest management Legal framework Tenure rights
Citation
Skulska, Iryna; Colaço, Maria Conceição; Aggarwal, Safia; Didier, Habimana; Monteiro, Maria do Loreto; Rego, Francisco Castro (2020). Assessment of Portuguese Community Forestry using the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure and FAO Community-Based Forestry Framework. Society and Natural Resources. ISSN 0894-1920. 33, p. 101-121