TARGET AREA SELECTION

The primary criteria for selection of VanPanchayats for assigning treatment areas are:

•    The VP must be in the priority ranges of the project.
•    The VP should have an elected body.
•    The VP should have given consent to participate in the project.
•    There should not be any similar on-going intervention.

VPs qualifying as per above criteria are further evaluated for their past performance, extent of forest degradation in the vicinity, possibility of cluster formation and target group population (socially/economically weaker sections such as BPL, ST and SC population).

GIS technology is adopted for carrying out spatial analysis of forest cover in proximity to each Van Panchayat. The technology also provides unique visualization support to study potential for cluster formation. The VPs are then assigned a score based on different parameters and arranged in descending order. The top scoring 10-20 VPs in each range, totaling 150 VPs were then selected in the 1st recommendation, to be treated, subject to further reconnaissance. A list of additional VPs is selected as stand by to fill the gaps created, by discarding VPs during reconnaissance.

Van Panchayats in the selected ranges with less than 10 years of experience in managing forests (i.e., constituted after year 2005), and having less than 20 ha area under their management (VP area < 20 ha), were flagged. Rest of the VPs were considered to have fairly good experience in managing VP forests both in terms of area as well as years of experience.