IGOs Vietnam policy brief RECOFTC
Unlocking the potential of induced grassroots
organizations as proponents of sustainable
forest management in Vietnam
By Tran Thi Binh, PhD
Unlocking the potential of induced grassroots organizations as
proponents of sustainable forest management in Vietnam
By Tran Thi Binh, PhD1
Key messages:
Many organizations created with the aim of improving community forest management
(CFM) in Vietnam are “Induced grassroots organizations” (IGOs)1 - organizations created
through donor or government funding.
IGOs can play a critical role in promoting the voice of local resource users in forest
governance, but in order to do this they need to meet local communities’ livelihood
aspirations and provide meaningful opportunities for local participation.
Many IGOs decision-making becomes dominated by government interests when
insufficient attention is paid to socially inclusive participatory processes and when the
regulatory environment is insufficiently enabling to empower communities to make forest
management decisions themselves.
Introduction
Box 1: Example IGOs
Since the late 1990s, international
conservation nongovernmental
organizations (INGOs) active in
Vietnam have established several types
of groups to engage local people in
forest conservation projects. For
instance: Forest protection and
management teams (set up by Fauna &
Flora International) Village patrol
teams (World Wide Fund for Nature),
and Site Support Groups (BirdLife
International). The GoV has also set up
forest protection groups under national
programs.
Over the past two decades, the Government of
Vietnam (GoV) has experimented with a variety of
policies seeking to include local people in sustainable
forest management. For example, Decree 02/CP (dated
January 1994) marked a radical move in shifting forest
management responsibility away from state
organizations to individual households. IGOs are
expected to encourage local people’s participation in
forest management, which would make a significant
contribution to sustainable forest management (see
Box 1).
This brief, based on PhD research of three IGOs in
Quang Tri province (see Map 1), explains how IGOs
can make important contributions to sustainable forest management in Vietnam. It argues that
IGOs can only play an important role if they are developed and sustained in a collaborative
manner. This brief also demonstrates that today’s IGOs tend to be technocratic2 in nature,
which severely restricts their contributions on the ground.
1
Binh Tran completed her PhD at School of Geography, Queen Mary University of London in March 2012.
The author would like to thank Dr Thomas Sikor at DEV, University of East Anglia, and Dr Nguyen Quang Tan and other
reviewers at RECOFTC for their valuable comments for this policy brief. She also would like to express her gratitude to
Queen Mary College Studentship without which her PhD this would not have been possible.
2
In the 1950s and 1960s, under the technocratic school of thought, it was thought that enhanced technical capacity of
professionals in forest management would be much more important to guarantee better forest conditions. As a result,
ensuring people’s participation in decision-making was not given priority, and natural resources were often managed to
protect their aesthetic beauty and biological values, not necessarily in the interests of people living around them
(Woodcock, 2002). In this context, local people were regarded as culprits responsible for the destruction of natural
resources. As a result, they were often bypassed if they were perceived as having inadequate capacity compared to that of
the experts (Chambers, 1983; Bond and Hulme, 1999).
1
Map 1: Quang Tri province
Forest management problems in Quang Tri and
the creation of IGOs
The study IGOs were located in three villages
(namely A, B and C3) inhabited by Van Kieu (an
ethnic minority) and Kinh (the majority ethnic group
in Vietnam) people. The second Indochina War
which resulted in forest degradation, displacement of
people and 45 to 75 poverty rates left the villages in
a state of high vulnerability. After 1975, state
institutions nationalized the forests, replacing
traditional forest governance. State-owned forestry
enterprises were established to control forest
extraction and forestland clearance for arable land.
Traditional forest management practices became
obsolete, as the majority of inhabitants were
migrants and a state decision-making structure
replaced the traditional one. Yet, local people had
little knowledge of the new system. According to
them, “We don’t understand anything about the
laws. In the past, we only knew about forest management rules established by the Già Làng
(traditional village heads)”. In addition, villagers had little sense of responsibility when they
did not feel they were the owner of the forest, “although recently we discussed the issues of
deforestation and its effects on our life, we did not come up with solutions because we think
that this is a task for government departments”.
In the early 2000s, two international donor funded projects sought to reverse the decline in
forest resources and forest governance by sponsoring the creation of IGOs in the three
villages. They established local groups that operate through an executive committee on a
daily basis and theoretically rely on village assemblies to hold the executive committees
accountable. The philosophy behind these groups is that they are composed of and run by
local people who are thereby empowered to address forest management issues that affect
their lives. As a result of this empowerment, it is expected that community cohesion and
awareness of environmental issues will increase along with opportunities for these groups to
develop.
How IGOs turn into technocratic institutions
Despite the good intentions, in practice the IGOs did not facilitate broad-based local
participation. All IGOs were set up by the relevant Commune People Committees (CPC) with
varying level of control from the provincial (Village B) and district (Villages A and C) Forest
Protection Department (FPD), so they consisted
“The formation of IGOs in Village B under
mainly of government staff.
the general direction of the provincial FPD
brought community, village administrative
and FPD officers together to work more
collaboratively within the arena of forest
protection” (forest protection officer)
A number of serious shortcomings hampered the
IGOs in all three villages. First, the IGOs
strengthened the capacity of local government, not
Following the guidance and approval for Consent for the Research by University of London’s Research Ethics
Committee the study villages were coded A, B, C to ensure their anonymity.
3
2
the local communities, to manage forests. Failing to mobilise wider participation of villagers
meant that these groups lost their general assemblies, rendering the existence of these groups
to mere extensions of government organizations.
Second, there was insufficient investment in IGOs for
“We did not know about the plan for the
livelihood improvement. Material supply (i.e rattan
nature reserve establishment at all until 2005
seedlings) was available but limited. In one village,
when the district FPD officers came to the
only 5 out of 54 households in the village gained
village to ask us to stop forest clearance for
access to this support. In all study villages, no
upland rice cultivation as one of rules of the
nature reserve” (villager).
extension services or market advice were provided to
support livelihood activities.
Picture 1: IGO members drawing routes of their forest patrols
Third, other benefits from joining IGOs were minimal. One of major objectives of the IGOs
is to support sustainable harvesting of both timber and non-timber products for subsistence
use among the study villages as one of incentives to encourage people to join forest
protection led by IGOs. Regarding firewood, the development of seasonal calendars with
women in these villages revealed that women did not collect firewood from the forests their
villages were assigned to protect. Meanwhile, timber for house construction turned out to be
unattractive or unavailable. For many families, their priority was to secure enough food. For
others, they could not sell timber to build brick houses, which they either preferred or found
the timber unsatisfactory for home building.
Fourth, the IGOs became more concerned with forest protection and policing the local people
than encouraging them to participate in beneficial IGO activities. The primary task
undertaken by the IGOs was to go on forest patrol to stop illegal logging and monitor
biodiversity. Villagers, in turn, understood the IGOs’ mission as seeking to “stop local people
from clearing forests” and to “punish local people if they continue cutting trees.”
This technocratic orientation made the IGOs focus on the government’s goal of forest
protection and ignore local people’s needs and aspirations for livelihood improvements. As a
result, IGOs rarely took part in forest management planning or other decision-making
processes. In village A, the IGO was unaware for more than a year of a plan to establish a
nature reserve around the village even though the IGO had been set up for the purpose of
biodiversity monitoring and forest protection. In that regard, the IGOs increased local
people’s vulnerability. They should have been providing them with new opportunities to
3
participate in forest management and overcome the conflict between forest protection and
livelihood improvement. It was not surprising that local villagers, “assented to government
requests for participation in forest patrols or forest protection, but they took no action to
implement their commitments”, as stated by an FDP staff.
A collaborative approach to IGOs
The insights from Quang Tri show that IGOs can contribute to sustainable forest management
in Vietnam, but only if they are developed and sustained in a collaborative manner.
Collaboration requires that IGOs, as representatives of local people, become equal partners
with government agencies in the forest governance process. Local communities need support
to be able to take part in participatory decision making and to organise themselves.
A collaborative approach for promoting the participation of IGOs in managing natural and
protection forests should be guided by the set of principles set out in the Table 1.
Table 1: Comparison between technocratic and collaborative approaches for managing
protection forests in Vietnam
Objective
Management
decision making
Activities
Right to forest
Law enforcement
Participants
Technocratic Approach
One dimensional: Conservation of
ecosystems and species
Externally
imported
technical
management: State agencies make
all
decisions
about
forest
management
Separate from other village and
livelihoods activities: focus on
forest patrols for biodiversity
monitoring and conservation
IGOs have no legal access to forest
resources
Collaborative Approach
multi-dimensional:
Variable,
as
mutually agreed upon
Builds on existing local traditional
knowledge and practice: state
agencies and IGOs jointly make
decisions
Integrated biodiversity conservation
with other farming and livelihoods
activities
IGOs have more secure rights to
forest resources in protection forests
when the government grants limited
use rights to IGOs. The rights should
be under
arrangements that see
individual household user rights
placed within a village-wide overall
structure for forest management
efforts
Forest Protection Department
IGOs have some power to enforce
rules in forests under their
management
Local state officials, men and head Villagers; men and women from each
of households
family, including minorities and
otherwise disadvantaged groups
In the context of implementing Payments for Forest Ecosystem Services (PFES) and
Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) in Vietnam, this
approach can be helpful to ensure meaningful participation of beneficiaries and equitable
benefit-sharing at the grassroots level. In addition, better functioning IGOs might support
local people to air their views more effectively before and during Free, Prior and Informed
4
Consent (FPIC4) process, which in turn might make PFES and REDD+ more responsive to
locality.
Policy Implications
IGOs should not be established in a technocratic manner if they are expected to contribute to
sustainable forest management or effective PFES or REDD+ implementation. Neither
governments nor large international donors have done enough to promote fully participatory
IGOs, as demonstrated by the experience reported above. Nevertheless, the GoV and
international donors can do more to empower local communities and promote more
participatory IGOs in a collaborative manner through the following measures:
Provide an enabling legal and administrative framework for the operation of IGOs.
For example, enabling them to register under the 2007 Decree on Cooperative
Groups, which enables them to receive more sufficient financial support from outside.
Alternatively, allow (I)GOs to structure themselves as they decide in terms of
executive and sub- committees so long as certain principles are upheld.
Allow the use of forest resources. One possible method is to divide and develop
different user rights to IGOs within protection forests and protected areas under comanagement agreements developed between management boards and IGOs.
Simplify the procedures for forest management planning and harvesting applicable to
co-management agreements between government agencies and IGOs.
Mainstream support to IGOs in project design by integrating indicators for IGO
performance in project monitoring and evaluation.
Strengthen the responsiveness of forest protection officers to IGO reports of illegal
logging activities.
4
FPIC is the principle that a community has the right to give or withhold its consent to proposed projects that
may affect the lands they customarily own, occupy or otherwise use.
5
Further reading and references
Bond, R. and Hulme, D. 1999. Process Approaches to Development: Theory and Sri Lankan
Practices World Development. 27(8). 1339-1358.
Borrini-Feyerabend, B. Taghi Farvar, M. Nguinguiri, J. and Ndangang, V. 2000. The Comanagement of Natural Resources: Organizing, Negotiating and Learning-by-Doing
(Access at http://www.eldis.org/static/DOC10516.htm).
Chambers, R. 1983. Rural Development: Putting the Last First. London: Longman.
Tran Thi Binh. 2012. Strengthening Grassroots Organizations for Forest Management: the
Case of Induced Forest-based Grassroots Groups in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. PhD
Thesis submitted to Queen Mary, University of London.
Uphoff, N. 1982. Rural Development and Local Organizations in Asia. New Delhi:
Macmillan India Ltd.
Woodcock, K. 2002. Changing Roles in Natural Forest Management: Stakeholders’ Roles in
the Eastern Arc Mountains, Tanzania. Hants: Ashgate.
6
RECOFTC
P.O. Box 1111
Kasetsart Post Office
Bangkok 10903, Thailand
Tel: +66 (0)2 940 5700
Fax: +66 (0)2 561 4880
Email: info@recoftc.org
Website: www.recoftc.org
organizations as proponents of sustainable
forest management in Vietnam
By Tran Thi Binh, PhD
Unlocking the potential of induced grassroots organizations as
proponents of sustainable forest management in Vietnam
By Tran Thi Binh, PhD1
Key messages:
Many organizations created with the aim of improving community forest management
(CFM) in Vietnam are “Induced grassroots organizations” (IGOs)1 - organizations created
through donor or government funding.
IGOs can play a critical role in promoting the voice of local resource users in forest
governance, but in order to do this they need to meet local communities’ livelihood
aspirations and provide meaningful opportunities for local participation.
Many IGOs decision-making becomes dominated by government interests when
insufficient attention is paid to socially inclusive participatory processes and when the
regulatory environment is insufficiently enabling to empower communities to make forest
management decisions themselves.
Introduction
Box 1: Example IGOs
Since the late 1990s, international
conservation nongovernmental
organizations (INGOs) active in
Vietnam have established several types
of groups to engage local people in
forest conservation projects. For
instance: Forest protection and
management teams (set up by Fauna &
Flora International) Village patrol
teams (World Wide Fund for Nature),
and Site Support Groups (BirdLife
International). The GoV has also set up
forest protection groups under national
programs.
Over the past two decades, the Government of
Vietnam (GoV) has experimented with a variety of
policies seeking to include local people in sustainable
forest management. For example, Decree 02/CP (dated
January 1994) marked a radical move in shifting forest
management responsibility away from state
organizations to individual households. IGOs are
expected to encourage local people’s participation in
forest management, which would make a significant
contribution to sustainable forest management (see
Box 1).
This brief, based on PhD research of three IGOs in
Quang Tri province (see Map 1), explains how IGOs
can make important contributions to sustainable forest management in Vietnam. It argues that
IGOs can only play an important role if they are developed and sustained in a collaborative
manner. This brief also demonstrates that today’s IGOs tend to be technocratic2 in nature,
which severely restricts their contributions on the ground.
1
Binh Tran completed her PhD at School of Geography, Queen Mary University of London in March 2012.
The author would like to thank Dr Thomas Sikor at DEV, University of East Anglia, and Dr Nguyen Quang Tan and other
reviewers at RECOFTC for their valuable comments for this policy brief. She also would like to express her gratitude to
Queen Mary College Studentship without which her PhD this would not have been possible.
2
In the 1950s and 1960s, under the technocratic school of thought, it was thought that enhanced technical capacity of
professionals in forest management would be much more important to guarantee better forest conditions. As a result,
ensuring people’s participation in decision-making was not given priority, and natural resources were often managed to
protect their aesthetic beauty and biological values, not necessarily in the interests of people living around them
(Woodcock, 2002). In this context, local people were regarded as culprits responsible for the destruction of natural
resources. As a result, they were often bypassed if they were perceived as having inadequate capacity compared to that of
the experts (Chambers, 1983; Bond and Hulme, 1999).
1
Map 1: Quang Tri province
Forest management problems in Quang Tri and
the creation of IGOs
The study IGOs were located in three villages
(namely A, B and C3) inhabited by Van Kieu (an
ethnic minority) and Kinh (the majority ethnic group
in Vietnam) people. The second Indochina War
which resulted in forest degradation, displacement of
people and 45 to 75 poverty rates left the villages in
a state of high vulnerability. After 1975, state
institutions nationalized the forests, replacing
traditional forest governance. State-owned forestry
enterprises were established to control forest
extraction and forestland clearance for arable land.
Traditional forest management practices became
obsolete, as the majority of inhabitants were
migrants and a state decision-making structure
replaced the traditional one. Yet, local people had
little knowledge of the new system. According to
them, “We don’t understand anything about the
laws. In the past, we only knew about forest management rules established by the Già Làng
(traditional village heads)”. In addition, villagers had little sense of responsibility when they
did not feel they were the owner of the forest, “although recently we discussed the issues of
deforestation and its effects on our life, we did not come up with solutions because we think
that this is a task for government departments”.
In the early 2000s, two international donor funded projects sought to reverse the decline in
forest resources and forest governance by sponsoring the creation of IGOs in the three
villages. They established local groups that operate through an executive committee on a
daily basis and theoretically rely on village assemblies to hold the executive committees
accountable. The philosophy behind these groups is that they are composed of and run by
local people who are thereby empowered to address forest management issues that affect
their lives. As a result of this empowerment, it is expected that community cohesion and
awareness of environmental issues will increase along with opportunities for these groups to
develop.
How IGOs turn into technocratic institutions
Despite the good intentions, in practice the IGOs did not facilitate broad-based local
participation. All IGOs were set up by the relevant Commune People Committees (CPC) with
varying level of control from the provincial (Village B) and district (Villages A and C) Forest
Protection Department (FPD), so they consisted
“The formation of IGOs in Village B under
mainly of government staff.
the general direction of the provincial FPD
brought community, village administrative
and FPD officers together to work more
collaboratively within the arena of forest
protection” (forest protection officer)
A number of serious shortcomings hampered the
IGOs in all three villages. First, the IGOs
strengthened the capacity of local government, not
Following the guidance and approval for Consent for the Research by University of London’s Research Ethics
Committee the study villages were coded A, B, C to ensure their anonymity.
3
2
the local communities, to manage forests. Failing to mobilise wider participation of villagers
meant that these groups lost their general assemblies, rendering the existence of these groups
to mere extensions of government organizations.
Second, there was insufficient investment in IGOs for
“We did not know about the plan for the
livelihood improvement. Material supply (i.e rattan
nature reserve establishment at all until 2005
seedlings) was available but limited. In one village,
when the district FPD officers came to the
only 5 out of 54 households in the village gained
village to ask us to stop forest clearance for
access to this support. In all study villages, no
upland rice cultivation as one of rules of the
nature reserve” (villager).
extension services or market advice were provided to
support livelihood activities.
Picture 1: IGO members drawing routes of their forest patrols
Third, other benefits from joining IGOs were minimal. One of major objectives of the IGOs
is to support sustainable harvesting of both timber and non-timber products for subsistence
use among the study villages as one of incentives to encourage people to join forest
protection led by IGOs. Regarding firewood, the development of seasonal calendars with
women in these villages revealed that women did not collect firewood from the forests their
villages were assigned to protect. Meanwhile, timber for house construction turned out to be
unattractive or unavailable. For many families, their priority was to secure enough food. For
others, they could not sell timber to build brick houses, which they either preferred or found
the timber unsatisfactory for home building.
Fourth, the IGOs became more concerned with forest protection and policing the local people
than encouraging them to participate in beneficial IGO activities. The primary task
undertaken by the IGOs was to go on forest patrol to stop illegal logging and monitor
biodiversity. Villagers, in turn, understood the IGOs’ mission as seeking to “stop local people
from clearing forests” and to “punish local people if they continue cutting trees.”
This technocratic orientation made the IGOs focus on the government’s goal of forest
protection and ignore local people’s needs and aspirations for livelihood improvements. As a
result, IGOs rarely took part in forest management planning or other decision-making
processes. In village A, the IGO was unaware for more than a year of a plan to establish a
nature reserve around the village even though the IGO had been set up for the purpose of
biodiversity monitoring and forest protection. In that regard, the IGOs increased local
people’s vulnerability. They should have been providing them with new opportunities to
3
participate in forest management and overcome the conflict between forest protection and
livelihood improvement. It was not surprising that local villagers, “assented to government
requests for participation in forest patrols or forest protection, but they took no action to
implement their commitments”, as stated by an FDP staff.
A collaborative approach to IGOs
The insights from Quang Tri show that IGOs can contribute to sustainable forest management
in Vietnam, but only if they are developed and sustained in a collaborative manner.
Collaboration requires that IGOs, as representatives of local people, become equal partners
with government agencies in the forest governance process. Local communities need support
to be able to take part in participatory decision making and to organise themselves.
A collaborative approach for promoting the participation of IGOs in managing natural and
protection forests should be guided by the set of principles set out in the Table 1.
Table 1: Comparison between technocratic and collaborative approaches for managing
protection forests in Vietnam
Objective
Management
decision making
Activities
Right to forest
Law enforcement
Participants
Technocratic Approach
One dimensional: Conservation of
ecosystems and species
Externally
imported
technical
management: State agencies make
all
decisions
about
forest
management
Separate from other village and
livelihoods activities: focus on
forest patrols for biodiversity
monitoring and conservation
IGOs have no legal access to forest
resources
Collaborative Approach
multi-dimensional:
Variable,
as
mutually agreed upon
Builds on existing local traditional
knowledge and practice: state
agencies and IGOs jointly make
decisions
Integrated biodiversity conservation
with other farming and livelihoods
activities
IGOs have more secure rights to
forest resources in protection forests
when the government grants limited
use rights to IGOs. The rights should
be under
arrangements that see
individual household user rights
placed within a village-wide overall
structure for forest management
efforts
Forest Protection Department
IGOs have some power to enforce
rules in forests under their
management
Local state officials, men and head Villagers; men and women from each
of households
family, including minorities and
otherwise disadvantaged groups
In the context of implementing Payments for Forest Ecosystem Services (PFES) and
Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) in Vietnam, this
approach can be helpful to ensure meaningful participation of beneficiaries and equitable
benefit-sharing at the grassroots level. In addition, better functioning IGOs might support
local people to air their views more effectively before and during Free, Prior and Informed
4
Consent (FPIC4) process, which in turn might make PFES and REDD+ more responsive to
locality.
Policy Implications
IGOs should not be established in a technocratic manner if they are expected to contribute to
sustainable forest management or effective PFES or REDD+ implementation. Neither
governments nor large international donors have done enough to promote fully participatory
IGOs, as demonstrated by the experience reported above. Nevertheless, the GoV and
international donors can do more to empower local communities and promote more
participatory IGOs in a collaborative manner through the following measures:
Provide an enabling legal and administrative framework for the operation of IGOs.
For example, enabling them to register under the 2007 Decree on Cooperative
Groups, which enables them to receive more sufficient financial support from outside.
Alternatively, allow (I)GOs to structure themselves as they decide in terms of
executive and sub- committees so long as certain principles are upheld.
Allow the use of forest resources. One possible method is to divide and develop
different user rights to IGOs within protection forests and protected areas under comanagement agreements developed between management boards and IGOs.
Simplify the procedures for forest management planning and harvesting applicable to
co-management agreements between government agencies and IGOs.
Mainstream support to IGOs in project design by integrating indicators for IGO
performance in project monitoring and evaluation.
Strengthen the responsiveness of forest protection officers to IGO reports of illegal
logging activities.
4
FPIC is the principle that a community has the right to give or withhold its consent to proposed projects that
may affect the lands they customarily own, occupy or otherwise use.
5
Further reading and references
Bond, R. and Hulme, D. 1999. Process Approaches to Development: Theory and Sri Lankan
Practices World Development. 27(8). 1339-1358.
Borrini-Feyerabend, B. Taghi Farvar, M. Nguinguiri, J. and Ndangang, V. 2000. The Comanagement of Natural Resources: Organizing, Negotiating and Learning-by-Doing
(Access at http://www.eldis.org/static/DOC10516.htm).
Chambers, R. 1983. Rural Development: Putting the Last First. London: Longman.
Tran Thi Binh. 2012. Strengthening Grassroots Organizations for Forest Management: the
Case of Induced Forest-based Grassroots Groups in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. PhD
Thesis submitted to Queen Mary, University of London.
Uphoff, N. 1982. Rural Development and Local Organizations in Asia. New Delhi:
Macmillan India Ltd.
Woodcock, K. 2002. Changing Roles in Natural Forest Management: Stakeholders’ Roles in
the Eastern Arc Mountains, Tanzania. Hants: Ashgate.
6
RECOFTC
P.O. Box 1111
Kasetsart Post Office
Bangkok 10903, Thailand
Tel: +66 (0)2 940 5700
Fax: +66 (0)2 561 4880
Email: info@recoftc.org
Website: www.recoftc.org