Assessment of dependency and consumption pattern of different forest products by the forest fringe villages of Shivalik Himalaya, Uttarakhand, India

Abstract

Forest are essential for human beings for the enormous services it gives for livelihood and subsistence in the developing countries. We estimated the consumption and extraction levels of three major forest products viz., timber, fuelwood, and fodder in 20 forest fringe villages of the Timli forest range of Uttarakhand, India. We used a questionnaire-based household-level survey to collect information on the household economy and dependence of 380 households selected through stratified random sampling. We estimated that 69% of the overall yearly timber consumption of 20 villages, which comes around 2750 cubic meters (cum), was extracted from the nearby forest. The average timber consumption was 0.52 ± 0.22 cum household-1 year-1. We estimated the total annual fuelwood and fodder consumption to be 298913.89, and 204475 Quintal (Qt). The average fuelwood and fodder consumption were estimated to be 417.6 Quintal household-1 year-1 and 49 ± 9.1 Qt. household-1 year-1. We did general linear regression analysis to assess major biophysical and socio-economic determinants of villages and households for dependency on timber, fuelwood, and fodder. We found that the population of the village, distance from forest, distance from market, and annual average income are the major determining factors for timber, fodder, and fuelwood demand of the villages. Extraction of timber and non-timber forest products was the primary cause of depletion of forest biomass and forest carbon emission. Conservation effective management strategies in collaboration with all the stakeholder departments are needed to conserve forest resources with minimum extraction pressure from forest fringe villages of the study area. Highlights Questionnaire based household level survey was done to assess extraction and consumption patter of fuelwood, fodder and timber in Shivalik range of Uttarakhand, India. Fuelwood and Timber consumption was found high compared to other studies in the low altitude areas. 69% of total timber and 62% of the total fodder requirement met from the adjacent forest areas. Population of the village, distance from the forest and nearby market place, and annual average income were the major determinants of dependency of different forest products.