Background and study objectives

Over the past decade or so, “joint” forest management has emerged as the key concept through which afforestation and forest regeneration activities are being implemented in most parts of India. In Karnataka, Joint Forest Planning and Management (JFPM) was launched in 1993 and has been implemented with major financial support (grants or loans) from bilateral agencies. During 1997-2002, the Karnataka Forest Department (KFD) took up the implementation of JFPM in the non-Western Ghats region of Karnataka under the Eastern Plains Forestry and Environment Project (EPFEP) with a budget of Rs.598 crores. The bulk of this budget was a loan from the Japanese Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC). We conducted an independent rapid assessment of the JFPM activities carried out under this project in the northern and southern maidan region, which comprises the major portion of the project implementation area, during 2002. The objectives of the assessment were: