Social Forestry in Karnataka

Social Forestry in Karnataka S Shyam Sunder S Parameswarappa WE refer to the article 'Social Forestry in Karnataka' An Impact Analysis' (EPW, June 13, 1987) This article has criticised the social forestry programme of the department based on the grounds that. It is oriented to favour the industry, more particularly the rayon grade pulp unit through propagation of eucalyptus; the findings of the Bureau of Economics and Statistics of the state confirms that 97 per cent of the eucalyptus grown in Kolar district is sold to the industry whereas social forestry implies growing of trees producing mulch, fodder, fruits and firewood; that additionally, in the departmental plantations only eucalyptus is seen being raised for benefiting the industry, that the concept of joint sector undertaking has been mooted at the instance of Hanhar Potyfibers to raise eucalyptus, for which areas in the high rainfall zone in the two districts are committed and from where, the poor cultivating the areas including project evacuees resettled are being removed As projected, if true, we deserve condemnation The projections made are partly the result of ignorance of the government's policies partly due to jumbling up of issues and partly the result of dubious method of projecting what is in conformity with the foregone conclusions of the authors and leaving out the rest One of the authors of the present report was the accredited guide for two earlier reports "Social, Economic and Ecological Impact of Social Forestry in Kolar" (1981) and "Ecological Audit of Eucalyptus Cultivation" (1985) which had built up their findings, sentence by sentence, on falsehoods to malign the forest departments in the country and destroy the afforestation programme. A few specimens are touched upon below.