What Matters for Wellbeing Outcomes of Community-Based Forest Restoration? Insights from Nepal’s Community Forestry

Nepal’s community forestry is a successful community-based forest management model for restoring degraded forests and for human wellbeing. While large-scale, top-down restoration projects that overlook local needs often run the risk of limited local benefits, locally led Community-Based Forest Restoration (CBFR) can lead to positive ecological and wellbeing outcomes. Taking the case of Nepal’s community forestry, this study explores the pathways through which CBFR contributes to human wellbeing. Data were collected from a survey of 374 households, six focus group discussions, and key informant interviews in six community-managed forests in Dolakha and Chitwan Districts of Central Nepal. An ordinal logistic regression was used to understand the relationships between forest user group dynamics, restoration activities and wellbeing outcomes. Findings revealed that factors such as active participation of households in user group and forest management activities, mechanisms to provide incentives (cash or in-kind) to households, engagement in leadership positions, and engagement of groups in forest-based income and employment generation activities are important for household wellbeing. However, the study identifies a distinct trade-off in that high meeting attendance, direct cash receipts from the user group, and substantial labor input are inversely correlated with perceived wellbeing benefits. Overall, our analysis suggests that CBFR not only leads to improved ecological outcomes but also contributes to human wellbeing of member households through income diversification and improved access to resources. Yet, wellbeing outcomes are not driven by isolated interventions but arise from the combined effect of group functioning (institutional mechanisms), restoration activities, and livelihood programs.