Community-based forestry
Community-based forestry (CBF) is an umbrella term that includes both collaborative regimes (forestry practiced on land that has some form of communal tenure and requires some level of collective action) and smallholder forestry (forestry practiced by smallholders on land that is generally privately owned).
In practice, these two forms are expressed in various CBF regimes according to the tenure rights enjoyed by, and the extent of empowerment of, communities in planning, implementation and benefit-sharing.
CBF aims to achieve two key outcomes: improved forest condition, and enhanced livelihoods for those communities and smallholders managing forests. The benefits of CBF in both biophysical and socioeconomics outcomes, have significant positive externalities. CBF is considered a potentially important delivery mechanism for a number of Sustainable Development Goals. It contributes to tackling climate change, conserving biodiversity, halting deforestation, combating desertification, and providing livelihoods.
FAO’s work to improve the effectiveness of community-based forestry
It aims to deliver on the following outcomes:
- Support the efforts of countries to create enabling environment for effective CBF.
- Raise awareness among policy-makers and civil society about the potential of Community-based forestry to ameliorate adverse impacts of climate change and contribute to other international policy initiatives such as biodiversity conservation, ecosystem restoration and rural transformation to alleviate poverty.
- Develop and disseminate approaches and tools needed to address, through community-based forestry, emerging issues in a changing global context.
- Support smallholder forestry and community forestry initiatives in the field, including within the framework of ecosystem restoration at large scale, biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation and adaptation and rural transformation.
Related links
Publications
Territorial approaches to forest governance
07/04/2025
This publication aims to identify current practices, positive and negative lessons, and institutional options for effective forest governance at larger...
Training material
Community-based forestry assessment
30/06/2020
This report outlines important insights into the successes and shortcomings of community-based forestry at the country level.
FAO Forestry Paper 183: FAO framework methodology for climate change vulnerability assessments of forests and forest dependent people
29/11/2019
This publication provides practitioners with step-by-step guidance for conducting vulnerability assessments using the most appropriate tools. The guide...
A framework to assess the extent and effectiveness of community-based forestry
30/08/2019
Well-performing community-based forestry (CBF) has the potential to rapidly restore forests in ecological terms and scale up sustainable forest management...
Status of community-based forestry and forest tenure in Honduras
01/08/2019
This policy brief highlights the findings from a forest tenure and community-based forestry assessment in Honduras. The brief promotes dialogue on current...
FAO Forestry Paper 176: Forty years of community-based forestry
02/11/2015
Since the 1970s and 1980s, community-based forestry has grown in popularity, based on the concept that local communities, when granted sufficient property...
Participatory forest management in Ethiopia, practices and experiences - SFE Technical Paper
01/01/2011
This report is the result of a survey of ten PFM actors in Ethiopia including stakeholders in the Federal Government of Ethiopia, regional governments,...
Enhancing stakeholder participation in national forest programmes - A training manual
01/01/2010
This training manual on enhancing stakeholder participation in national forest programmes (nfp) is one of several modules being developed as part of...
Enhancing stakeholder participation in national forest programmes - Tools for practitioners
01/01/2009
FAO and the National Forest Programme Facility have developed a capacity building module on Enhancing stakeholder participation in nfps, to enable countries...
Enhancing stakeholder participation in National Forest Programmes - Forest policy brief
01/01/2009
There is a growing recognition of the wide range of goods and services that forests provide at all levels of society – to the millions of people living...
Forests and people: 25 years of community forestry
01/01/2001
Almost 25 years have elapsed since the concept of community-based forest management emerged as a focus for addressing the linkages between forestry...
Types and characteristics of CBF
CBF regimes can be categorized according to forest tenure rights that are devolved to the managing communities.
There are five generic types of CBF from limited rights, which provide only for passive participation in government programmes, through to a comprehensive set of rights, which empower communities and smallholders to manage forests actively.
Forest tenure rights can vary in their duration (from time-limited to perpetual), in the ease with which they can be changed or extinguished, and the nature of any compensation, that may be available to communities if rights are revoked or extinguished.
Strong property rights are those embedded in constitutions or laws, which can only be amended by plebiscites or parliaments.
Weak rights are those in lower levels of the regulatory framework, such as ministerial directions, rules and regulations. Weak rights can be easily changed by administrative discretion.
Six policy actions are needed to improve biophysical and socioeconomic outcomes of CBF.