Consumers’ body flays intervention in community forests

The Maoists and the government have been interfering into the community forest consumers’ groups and have put unnecessary pressure, the Federation of Community Forests Consumers Groups (FCFCG) today said at a press conference in Kathmandu.

The “people’s governments” of the Maoists in districts have been pressuring for donations and while the government side is also charging extra ‘revenue’ and has even set up security camps in community forests, a press release issued by the FCFCG stated.

The establishment of district forestry coordination committees and the directives approved by the government have downsized the rights of consumers, FCFCG representatives said, demanding that the government immediately scrap the directives.

The FCFCG has also threatened to launch protests against the government move.

Similarly, the federation has requested the political parties, community forestry consumer groups, NGOs, INGOs and the civil society not to participate in the committees formed under the new directives.

Speaking at the press meet, FCFCG secretary Bhim Prasad Shrestha said the directives, which are yet to be implemented fully, which states the provisions of sharing benefits of ‘mutual forest’ - 25 percent revenue to forest management committee and 75 percent to the government fund whereas it is the other way round in the case of community forests – is unfair. “This is a ploy of the government to make people slaves,” said he.

According to FCFCG, there are more than 14,000 ‘community forestry committees’ in Nepal and 113,991 hectors of forest area is managed by these committees. In this movement, around 854,077 people from 1,574,029 households have participation.

The FCFCG has decided to participate in the ongoing pro-democracy movement for human rights, peace, democracy and social justice by the civil society, political parties and different social networks. nepalnews.com sg Sept 21 02