Documentation:Open Case Studies/FRST522/2021/Stakeholders as drivers of community forestry? A Case Study of the Danongdafu Forestation Area in Taiwan

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Summary

Since the 21st century, the Forestry Bureau has been actively engaged in reforestation in the plain area which become Danongdafu Flatland Forest Park after a decade of cultivation.  Danongdafu Forestation Area, represents one of Taiwan’s most controversial cases concerning land use, indigenous rights, and environmental issues. This is also a representative of the complicated history that Taiwan has experienced with regard to indigenous land issues and the fact that indigenous people were and remain oppressed. Most of the implementation of past policies adopted non-voluntary approach policy tools, such as “control” or “regulatory restrictions” to attain policy goals without the participation of the locals.

Keywords

Community Forestry; Taiwan; Indigenous; Stakeholders; Partnership; Governance; Land Rights

Background

Taiwan’s location is at the junction of tropical and subtropical. In addition to the high-altitude differences, Taiwan has a complex formation of forest with subtropical evergreen forests occupying most of the island while South Taiwan monsoon rainforests cover the southern tip and, evergreen broadleaved forests are gradually replaced by deciduous hardwoods and conifers as elevation increases.  Yet, the centuries-long development has forced the primitive forests to retreat from the plains.  Today, forest cover is estimated to be about 52 percent of the total land area, although much of this consists of non-native tree plantations.

For a long period of time, the central government shaped the political, economic, social, institutional, and ecological contexts; dominated resilience discourses and determined the problem-framing and problem-solving agenda; defined the scale and levels at which social-ecological system governance issues were addressed; and determined the knowledge system used to define and solve problems.  The start of community forestry in Taiwan is mainly to follow the development of participatory approach of international forestry management as early as in the 1990s.  At that time, the focus was mostly on how to develop forestry operated by the private sector, or called public-private forests in earlier days, and there was no consideration of community approaches.  In 2001, the Forestry Bureau started to plan and promote community forestry projects. At the beginning, the Forestry Bureau positioned community forestry as "a channel that directly allows residents of mountain villages to cooperate with government departments."  In March 2002, the Forestry Bureau started to pilot the "Community Forestry-Residents Participate in Conservation and Symbiosis Program", officially launching the domestic community forestry program.

Danongdafu Forest Area

Figure 1 Danungdafu Area (DFA) and nearby indigenous communities Source: Tai p.3

Situated in between the Central Range and the Coastal Range and located in Guangfu Township of Hualien County, “Danongdafu Forestation Area” (thereafter DFA) is situated in the East Rift Valley with the Central Range and the Coastal Range on either side.  Traveling down south along the Valley about halfway through, there is a vast, endless forest after passing the chimney of Hualien Sugar Factory. It is Taiwan's first flat forest park, with a rich natural ecology, with flowers in spring, fireflies and birds in summer, and maple in autumn and winter.  There are North Ring and South Ring bicycle lanes in the park.  The map (Figure 1) by Tai showed the geographic location of DFA. The area enclosed by red line is DFA, the nearby indigenous groups Tafalong, Fata’an, Fahol, Okakay, Sado were represented by red dots, while Han–indigenous communities (Daho, Fuhsing, Fuyuan, Galiwan) comprised majority by Han people were represented by yellow dots.

Tenure Arrangements

To meet the national development goals of different periods, DFA was assigned with varying policy tasks.  Prior to Japanese rule of Taiwan from 1895 to 1945, the DFA was covered by bush forests.  Indigenous people of the Amis tribe, particularly the Karowa community, resided and engaged in slash-and-burn farming, and hunted to sustain livelihoods and maintain their traditional common-pool resources regime.  Another Amis community, Tafalong, also used this land for livelihood and cultural festivals (Tai, 2015).  They are mainly the affected stakeholders.

The shift in 1895 to Japanese rule fundamentally changed both human communities and the landscape of the DFA.  At the early stages of the colonial rule, the Japanese government legislated to nationalize property rights of all “ownerless” land in Taiwan, most of which was Taiwan’s indigenous people’s traditional territory. In 1921, a Japanese private enterprise, Salt and Sugar Ltd., acquired use rights of DFA and began to expel the Karowa community of Amis people who were forced to displace to marginal lands and other indigenous communities around DFA and other spots in central Hualien County. From 1921 to 1945, the previous forest was transformed into a monoculture of sugar cane production. The demographic composition also converted as the labor-intensive nature of cane sugar plantation and industry recruited large numbers of Chinese-descent workers “Han people” (making up 97% of the Taiwan population) from western Taiwan and China.  They came from outside the community and can be regarded as the interested stakeholders.

After Second World War in 1945, the central government of the Republic of China took over the DFA land and the Salt and Sugar Ltd.’s productive assets, which were further nationalized in 1946 into the Taiwan Sugar Corporation. The sugar industry had continuously increased production since 1947.  In 1953, the Taiwan Sugar Corporation began to expel indigenous people especially the Karowa community still living in DFA. By 2002, sugar production in DFA discontinued and the land was abandoned from cultivation. With the rise and fall of the sugar industry, the population of Han people in surrounding communities experienced a similar trend. The Daho community, a typical settlement of sugar industry workers, had 6000 people during the peak, but only a few hundred residents live there recently.

Before the mid-1980s, local DFA communities submissively followed the jurisdictional and institutional arrangements. Along with the “Return My Land Movement” in which indigenous tribes began to claim traditional territories, a series of protests were organized throughout the 1990s. Beginning in 2003, the DFA was quickly transformed into a forestation area, but sapling species were selected and planted depending upon the availability in the sapling market.  Perspectives of stakeholders, especially surrounding communities, were not considered.  In effect, DFA land was snatched and registered as owned by the state.   Land property rights belong to the Taiwan Sugar Corporation, which has the central governmental control over most shares.  The Forestry Bureau of central government takes charge of the management of forests.  

Institutional Arrangements

In 2002, the Forestry Bureau initiated the “Community Forestry” policy to promote community-based environmental governance. This policy focused on, but was not limited to, nature conservation and ecotourism.  Through the local community development associations, most local communities in DFA have participated in the Community Forestry projects .  Community forestry can be said to be a government plan that attempts to promote the connection with local communities through the development of local eco-tourism .

After 2011, a new participatory governance regime emerged. Multiple stakeholders, including indigenous communities, the affected stakeholders, began to contribute to resilience discourses and influenced governance and trade-offs among differing governance goals .  This aims to achieve biodiversity and sustainable development through community participation to reduce the tension between the forestry authorities and aboriginal communities, and to encourage local forestry authorities to share forest resources with locals .  However, the governance regime still shows a mismatch in scale and fit dimensions and has limited capacities in knowledge, diversity, uncertainties, thresholds, social capital, and leadership which is characterized as non-participatory and non-deliberative; monocentric with a two-tier structure of dominant state and weak communities; upward accountability and unjust; and very loose networks . The current DFA governance institution has begun to incorporate the views of multiple stakeholders, and, to a limited extent, allow more governance power to these stakeholders.   More active, mostly local actors are participating in the governance process, contributing their views, and have exerting influences on governance and trade-offs among differing governance goals.  This is certainly meaningful progress that can help people strike a balance between national and local perspectives .

Taiwan has been implementing community forestry projects since 2002 and adopting a three-stage design plan development to gradually establish partnerships with local communities for collaborative resource management: the first stage is based on "idea promotion and talent cultivation", the second stage aims at "forestry demonstration community construction": the third stage vision is "forest joint management" (Lu et. al. 2011, p.137). As far as the overall implementation of community forestry is concerned, it does have the function of promoting the image of the Forestry Bureau and strengthening community construction. However, in terms of implementations, the nature of the first-stage plan is just education and training.  Even if it enters the second stage, there are still a small number of people who can actually participate in forestry management.   Regarding the issue of “co-management” mentioned in the third stage of community forestry, issues such as the presentation of sex, traditional organizations, hunter-gathering issues, and economic incentives still need to be further clarified.  The key to the establishment of a co-management mechanism is the mutual trust and consensus between Forestry Bureau and indigenous tribes which based on the existing mechanism of dialogue and interaction (Lu, 2009).

For the indigenous communities who are the affected stakeholders in DFA, the pursuit of their own social-ecological system resilience is long and extremely difficult under the established structure.  Both in an era of economic development and an era of highlighted social-ecological systems, this struggle is the same.  The emergence and goodwill of the participatory governance model does help indigenous people express their views and substantially influence the governance process and outcomes, but it is far from sufficient to address the roots of the “resilience for mainstream society” phenomenon: the established land ownership and subsequent governance authority .                                                              

A nationwide, systematic solution relies on the Indigenous Land and Ocean Act are under discussion in parliament.  However, due to the complexity of the issue, the passage of this bill is likely remote and far from certain .   The current institutional arrangement is not very flexible, and autonomy of indigenous people is difficult to integrate with the national legal and administrative system.  The grassroots personnel have insufficient knowledge of the indigenous people’s cultural society and autonomous direction.  The two sides have different perceptions of partnerships and legal status in traditional fields and the vision of co-management is vague . Highlighting “resilience for indigenous people” is important not only to indigenous people but also for the DFA region and the overall social-ecological system resilience of Taiwan, people have always concentrated on discussing ecological resilience and the well-being of Han society .

Overall, Taiwan's Forestry Bureau actively enter the community through community forestry, provide funds and technology to interact with the community, and enhance the Forestry Bureau image at the grassroots level in the community, but its substantial contribution to forest management and conservation is very limited .

Social Actors and Stakeholders

Buffering the DFA, there are several local communities which are historically, socio-economically, culturally closely related to this piece of land.  Populations of these communities has two main demographic sources: indigenous Amis people (the affected stakeholders) and Chinese-descent Han people (the interested stakeholders). Some indigenous communities near DFA advocate that DFA is a traditional territory of social, cultural, and economic significance. Therefore, they accordingly claim resumption of the land property rights. As shown in Figure 2, indigenous group Karowa’s elder was attending a Forestry Bureau-led public hearing session. The head of the Forestry Bureau questioned about the existence of Karowa group in the DFA, which was accused by the Karowa elder.

Figure 2 Conflict between Head of the Forestry Bureau and the Karowa elder https://news.ltn.com.tw/news/local/paper/541028

In contrast, Han people, the interested stakeholders, generally do not claim land property rights but have a high expectation of being able to benefit from utilization of land and forests. Although the two populations have different views concerning land rights and different origins of cultural identity, they do share similar sense of belonging to the land of DFA, and are highly interested in governance issues.

From 2011 to the present, however, cooperation between the management agency and some communities has strengthened, especially for specific community forestry projects promoting ecotourism.  For communities mainly composed of Han people who were deeply affected by the collapse of sugar industry, the main concerns were improvement of livelihood, not land tenure.  The indigenous communities, the affected stakeholders, including Mafo, Daho, Galiwan, Dahsing, Fuhsing, etc. are basically happy with the government’s plan to transform forests into a forest park with tourism potential, although they also complain that the government has never provided adequate opportunities for local communities to participate in decision-making processes.  Furthermore, these indigenous communities do not want to have conflict with the government.  Under the Community Empowerment and Community Forestry policy, these communities have obtained several government projects.

Evolution of the DFA social-ecological system in the current post-sugarcane phase is deeply affected by changes in: (1) forestation policy; (2) the institutional framework regarding indigenous affairs; (3) community development and community forestry policy; and (4) tourism development policy .  The transformation of DFA in 2003 did not consider the controversial nature of land property rights.  This issue has increasingly become focus of concern, because of the indigenous “Return My Land Movement” and the subsequent changes in institutional consideration of indigenous affairs.  A constitutional amendment in 1997, and passing the Indigenous Peoples Basic Law in 2005, recognizes and protects indigenous rights to land and natural resources in traditional territories.  These laws are the fundamental institutional framework from which many indigenous initiatives lay claim to traditional territories . Under the established structures dominated by Han people, indigenous views, rights, and well-being continue to be ignored.  Affirmative action is required to recognize and safeguard indigenous rights which facilitate the transformation from “resilience for mainstream society” to “resilience for indigenous people” in indigenous territories .

In the era of economic development, the DFA was used to produce commercial agricultural products of high economic value.  In today’s era, emphasizing global environmental changes, the land was converted into forests to enhance ecological resilience and to serve as support for the resilience of the national social-ecological system.   Whether or not the focus is on the well-being of social systems or ecological resilience, as a matter of fact, the needs of indigenous people (the affected stakeholders) were dismissed by mainstream society’s dominant powers (the interested stakeholders) .

Figure 3 Amis lady protested for fifteen days to urge Taiwan Sugar to respect their land https://www.newsmarket.com.tw/blog/92812/

The Karowa community resumed to ongoing protest national policies in the first decade of 21^st Century and formed extensive alliances with indigenous and environmental movement non-governmental organizations to fight for land tenure .  Karowa, Tafalong and numerous bridging organizations successfully launched a protest during the opening ceremony of the new DFA on 25 May 2011, attracting nationwide attention via media reports.  After the event, public opinion and pressure from their superiors forced the management agency to offer opportunities for participation and collaboration.  A meeting was held and attended by all communities surrounding DFA, but it fell apart due to heated debate among communities and the management agency. During the new visitor center of Danongdafu Forest Park on December 8, 2020, Amis people protested at the venue by pulling up a piece of cloth, calling on the Forest Management Office and Taiwan Sugar not to continue to erase local history in the name of art and literature (Figure 3 and 4). They should cooperate with the tribe to respect the land and cultural rights of the tribe.  An Amis people revealed that the so-called "great farmers and rich plains forests" were traditional farmland, grazing land, and hunting grounds of the Ami people in the past. Nowadays, there is still no reflection on the legitimacy of "Ten Years of Success" and the use of art endorsements to grab land.  The activity is cunning like "It's nice to have you and where the story begins.".

Figure 4 Amis group protested around the Danongdafu Forestation Area https://www.newsmarket.com.tw/blog/92812/

During a phone interview with a representative from Karowa indigenous group, the tribal member stated that the boundary of their traditional land ownership should base on the oral history of tribal elders and his own grandparents, traditional place names, and tribal hunting, farming and other life experiences. It is completely different from the modern Han people's concept of land ownership. The issue of land right is not just a dispute about numbers and laws, but it actually shapes and affects the life of their tribal groups, gives impact to their culture and sense of justice. Speaking of the Karowa’s traditional land, which is now a piece of land under Taiwan Sugar (a government enterprise), and there is no sign the land will be returned to the tribal group. They feel very helpless and hopeless to get back their land which inherited from generation to generation from their ancestors. He urged the government to return the land to them and make the tenure system clearer.

Echoing the issues mentioned by Karowa tribal member at the interview, Han people are the dominate group over the established political, economic, institutional, social, and cultural structures. The current participatory governance regime primarily reflects the power, views, and interests of Han society.   The governance of the DFA can be said to have changed from the “resilience for the public” mode to the “resilience for both the public and local people” mode. Regardless of the mode, though, the main beneficiaries are Han people (the interested stakeholders), not indigenous people (the affected stakeholders).  In fact, indigenous people almost always pay a disproportionate price in decision-making.

Aims and Intentions

Community forestry refers to forest management that has ecological sustainability and local community benefits as central goals, with some degree of responsibility and authority for forest management formally vested in the community.  It is also a community based forest management concept and operation mode in which communities are encouraged to give forest management proposals for the collaboration with forest management organizations and form the partnerships with the community residents and organizations by fully communicating with the public and achieving consensus, with the aim at maintaining biodiversity and developing ecosystem service value of environmental resources, so as to achieve the goal of sustainable forest management and effectively improve the economy and environment of the local community, especially the relationship with the indigenous people.  

Protecting and enhancing biodiversity is one of the most important ecological goals of community forestry.  Meeting this goal depends on a complex interaction of ecological as well as social and economic factors.  Through community building of sharing forest resources, it hopes to bring local forestry authorities and people closer. Based on the forest management proposals of "Taiwan Forestry Bureau" in 2011-2020, the aim and intentions include "promoting community forestry and the partnership establishment", "employing indigenous people and working with its communities to patrol and protect forests", "forest products taken in traditional indigenous areas" and "public participation and partnership in forest recreation area" .  Community forestry holds promise as a viable approach to forest conservation and community development.  The strategy and direction of community forestry is to initiate communication with community residents with small funds, cultivate community talents and construct organization, and then allow communities to gradually participate in forestry management.

Assessment of Governance and the Power Relationship

State policies on communities and forests serve the interests of powerful actors (local elites or distant authorities), while extracting resources from disempowered and further impoverished local people.   There are several problems in Taiwan’s current community forestry: lack of clear policies and appropriate institutional arrangements, as well as insufficient local cultivation and participation.  “Communication”, “resources, skills, and capacities”, and “the cognition policy goals, and the intention between the government and the community” are factors which impact participation.  There were no real participatory and deliberative processes from planning implementation whereby indigenous land rights and cultural identity issues were not on the agenda.

The influx of stakeholders and the indigenous peoples' demands for traditional domains and natural sovereignty are important topics for the promotion of community forestry in the DFA.  Besides, rights and obligations, lawfulness, interactive community organizations, and local factions in Community Forestry are also main factors which need clarification of the responsibilities and obligations of the government and the participants in voluntary approach policies in the future and giving participants the appropriate education and training increasing incentives to reach the policy goals.

Obviously, affirmative action is very much needed to effectively recognize and safeguard indigenous autonomy.  Redefining land ownership and returning land rights to indigenous people is undoubtedly a highly challenging political issue in Taiwanese society.  It is also required to have a better understanding of how newly created institutions for forest management established by state community forestry policies articulate with preexisting, customary institutions for forest management in communities, and how states and communities negotiate their interests in the decentralization and devolution process.

In conclusion, the application of community forestry in indigenous communities, the affected stakeholders, faces the poor design of the community forestry system, the rigid bureaucracy, and the talents of the indigenous communities.  These challenges require Forestry Bureau to build mutual trust with time and patience, and gain consensus through open and interactive participation, or the main key is whether different parties, both the interested and affected stakeholders, can let go of the past entanglements and power barriers and look to the future together.

Recommendations

DFA needs to navigate toward a governance regime that is more participatory, deliberative, multi-layered, accountable, just, and networked which can be done by developing an intermediate institution to coordinate cross-scale and cross-level interactions in ways that may more adequately fit the DFA social-ecological system.  The central government should upgrade its community-based policy to a regional social-ecological system governance policy that encourages bottom-up participation of local communities in governance.  As part of its top-down action, the government should admit to the historically unjust nature of current land tenure and dominant governmental power.

Biodiversity conservation and community development have multiple dimensions, and trade-offs between specific aspects of one may be needed to achieve specific aspects of the other.  Making trade-offs need not undermine the entire endeavor.  Communities and other stakeholders must consciously negotiate and choose which tradeoffs to make.  Dominant information and financial incentives are the most common instruments for protecting the ecological equilibrium and the analysis of power can be a valuable factor in explaining the outcomes of community forestry in practice .  Community forestry is a complex collective action by forest users that takes place within a broader network of multiple actors at local, national, and international levels. Powerful actors have a significant influence on the outcomes of community forestry for the local users .

Community forestry still holds the capacity to reconcile forest protection with local livelihoods and local participation. It has considerable potential for success when state and subnational agencies have the political will to work with local communities, providing financial subsidy, technical assistance, and degrees of accountability, transparency and (local) autonomy.  In these spaces, local communities are more likely to marshal the capacity to organize and sustain community forestry in a locally appropriate and beneficial manner well into the future.