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Selected Non -Timber Forest Products for Natural Resources Conservation and Community Development in Southwest Yunnan, China 1

Wang Kanglin, Xu Jianchu, Pei Shengji and Chen Sanyang 2

1. Introduction

Peters (1994) definition of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) are biological resources other timber winch are harvested from either natural or managed forests. It includes , nuts, oil seeds, , , gums, medicinal plants, , wildlife and wildlife products, dyes, ornamental plants, and raw materials such as and rattan.

This paper focuses exclusively on the role of several selected non-timber forest products in natural resources conservation and community development, with particular emphasis on traditional knowledge and practices of bamboo and rattan in indigenous community. The main objective of this article is to give an introduction of non-timber forest products that has been management and used in indigenous communities of southwest Yunnan. More specifically, dime objectives have been identified as central concerns of this article. 1) review the concept and importance of non-timber forest products; 2) determine and describe traditional knowledge and practices of bamboo and rattan by indigenous community; and 3) recommend some priority model and pre- pare some recommendation for sustainable development.

2. Importance of NTFPs

In the past, non-timber forest produces were viewed to be of less economic and ecological importance, and government policies and activities focused mainly on timber. In recent years, however, NTFPs have been accorded international priority in contrast to their categorization as "minor forest products". This heightened attention results from recognition of the need for sustainable use of the resources and the need for development while maintaining biodiversity (Williams et al. 1991). The argument of Hall and Bawa (1993) that non-timber forest products from tropical forests have become a subject of mounting international concern as a result of several factors which affect the availability of many tropical species. First, continuing in the tropics threatens to eliminate hundreds, if not thousands, of species during the next few decades. Second, effective conservation and management of NTFPs is viewed as a means of improving the rural economy and the well-being of indigenous societies that rely on. Third, there is a growing recognition that rural community, which rely on a variety of plant and animal species for their livelihoods, should participate in conservation of tropical biodiversity. Fourth, many species that yield of NTFPs are assumed to be potential sources of new genes as well as new products particularly drugs, and thus are valuable to the international agriculture and pharmaceutical industries.

Non-timber forest products have had significant assigned value in the life of people living in and around forests (Chopra, 1993). Campbell (1996) listed some common assumption about managing forests for NTFP which include 1) important for trials and forest dependent communities (subsistence needs, and commercial benefits: employment and income), 2) represents hidden value of forests (management may conserve biodiversity) , 3) important source of state revenue, 4) potential for sustainable harvesting, 5) potential for local value addition (enterprise development, processing and marketing) , 6 ) benefit may be more equitably shared, 7) builds on indigenous knowledge, and 8) fits with community/joint forest management.

3. Case Studies in Xishuangbanna

Mengsong is a mountain community, located in Xishuangbanna prefecture, Southern Yunnan province, Southwest China. It has a southern sub-tropical climate, the annual temperature averages are 16 oC - 18 oC, and annual precipitation ranges from 1400mm - 1600mm a year, of which 80% - 90% are concentrated in the rainy season. This area is mainly covered with evergreen broad - forest, some areas are still well protected Page 2 of 7

tropical rainforest. There are 11 minority nationality villages with a population of 2620 in Mengsong, among these Hani people (Akha) dwell in 10 villages and Lahu people in one village. In Mengsong, indigenous communities have unique knowledge system for sustainable utilization and conservation of natural resources, and rattan and bamboo cultivation, utilization and conservation can provide an experimental example.

3.1 Bamboo

As an undoubtedly the most economically important of non-timber forest products, bamboo is a plant of ancient and increasing importance for humanity. Known as " the wood of the poor" in , "the friend of the people" in China, and "the brother" in Vietnam. The most significant uses of bamboo in Asian countries for writing instruments, building materials, furniture, materials, household utensils, and agricultural tools. The shoots of some species are used as vegetable. Other important uses are as source of raw material for making paper, musical instrument, religious articles, medicine, weapons and other novelty items. In short, bamboo has been used widely in the daily life of the people as a sustainable natural resource.

All ethnic communities in Yunnan have a long-term tradition for planting, managing and conserving bamboo resources. Bamboo forests are classified into dime types of property: national, community and family/individual bamboo forests. These are managed or protected by different agencies or individuals. In many indigenous communities, bamboo has been reasonable management and efficient conservation, which are given below:

3.1.1 Community based conservation

Many bamboo species, naturally distributed and cultivated, are protected in community forests, such as bamboo in "Sangpabawa" (community rattan protected forest), "Nong Man" or "Nong Meng" (communities Holy Hills), "Nong Ban" (village Holy Hills in Dai ethnic groups), "Ba Hao" and "Lao Ben" (Graveyard forests, in Dai and Hani communities, respectively)," Gai Mei San Ha" (Water-source forests in Hani communities) are efficient protected and well managed.

3.1.2 Family/individual based conservation

Homegardens, bamboo gardens (Apeya, in Hani community), agroforestry practice, and swidden farming form a series of traditional systems for sustainable cultivation, management and conservation of bamboo resources. The bamboo clumps or forests belonging to every family are cut, managed, and conserved by the families. The Mengsong Hani people have developed an agroforestry system. They cultivate bamboo in the swidden lands, and plant rattan using the bamboo clumps as support for the climbing rattan. Tobacco is inter- cropped among the bamboo clumps. The bamboo branch or culm is sometimes burned and the ash is used to fertilize tobacco. In other cases, bamboo is intercropped with maize, beans, vegetables and other crops in the agroforestry system of the Hani community of Mengsong. Short, medium and long-term income is obtained from the bamboo, rattan and these crops. The sloping swidden land is used for long-term agriculture products, thanks to the conservation of soil by the well developed -system of bamboo and rattan plants.

3.2 Rattan

Considered a minor in comparison to timber, rattan as a non-timber forest resource, is very important economically. Based on its extraordinarily versatile characteristics, such as its remarkable beauty, cheapness, extremely durable and tough, resilient, flexible, and renewability, rattan canes are utilized in making , suitcases, winnowing trays, furniture, tables, chairs, sleeping mats, , clotheslines, agricultural tools, fish traps, and others. Some parts of the rattan plant are used for food, such as the ripe fruits which can be eaten, and very young shoots (cabbage) of some species are used as vegetable. As such, rattans have very close interrelationship with man's everyday life (Dransfield 1976; Ave 1988; Piper 1992).

The report of Bote (1988) emphasized the potential and prospects of the rattan for further growth and development:

1. It is an industry that generates foreign exchange; 2. It is an industry with high value added; 3. It requires very little imported components; 4. It uses a renewable resource; 5. It is a highly labor intensive industry, which are in backyard-level operation; 6. It is a rural-based industry contributing to the arrest of rural-to-urban migration; and 7. It is industry with established markets abroad. Page 3 of 7

On the other hand, rattans are an important component of tropical rain forests, as an indigenous system producing both food and cash crops without ecological disruption (Weinstock 1983). In some studies (Chen et al. 1993; Godoy and Feaw 1991), the forest has been controlled and managed by the villages under their folk laws, the villages ran collect rattan products, and the forest has been protected. It is believed that rattans are forest plants which have an important role in protecting biodiversity, especially when local people get involved in protecting and maintaining sustainable of the rattans in the forest.

In Mengsong, local people have indigenous practices on planting, management, harvesting and conservation of rattan. Based on their thinking, these practices system can be divided into two kinds:

3.2.1 "Qeiya-Aneya"- Indigenous rattan cultivation in swidden fields

All villages of the Mengsong community have practiced swidden cultivation for the last 400 years, and cultivation of rattan in swidden fields is a common traditional practice among Hani villages of this community. Each family has planted from a few to hundreds of clumps of rattan in their swidden fields-the "Dongya" system. "Dongya" is general term in Hani language for swidden farming system, which consists of four sub- systems in accordance with the type of cropping system practiced:

1. "Qeiya-Aneya" in Hani language refers to the system of upland rice and rattan (rice + rattan agroforestry). 2. "Qeiya-Apeya" refers to the system of intercropping rice and bamboo (rice + bamboo agroforestry 3. "Aduya-Wunueya" refers to the system of corn and vegetables, and 4. "Leboya" refers to tea planting system.

The "Qeiya Aneya" upland rice-rattan swidden field is one of the major swidden components of the swidden farming system of this area. A rough estimate of these rattan-rice swidden lands is about 400 hectares. According to a sampling survey of 31 household in the community, each household has 28.5 clumps of rattan in the swidden field, which indicates that about 14478 clumps of rattan have been planted in the said fields. The annual production of rattan cane from swidden fields in the community during 1985 - 1989 has been approximately 10 tons. This makes 50% of the total production of canes in the community (Chen et al. 1993).

There are some cultivated practices of rattan in "Dongya":

(1) Preparing: A "screen afforestation" method used to plant rattans in swidden field. Slopes along stream in the swidden fields, boundary edges of swidden cultivation fields, patches with bigger trees or tree stumps in the swidden field are suitable locations in the swidden fields for planting rattans. After allocating land, surface clearing is done in a small part of the land; the rest of the field is completely cleared up for upland rice growing;

(2) Planting: Seedlings are prepared in the same swidden field and seeds are collected from rattan forest or swidden fields. When seedlings reach to about 20 cm height in the second year, they are implanted under the tree or around big tree stumps. Transplanting is usually in May because this is the start of the rainy season. Direct sowing of seeds is also practiced, 3 - 6 seeds are needed for each planting hole. Somebody also used sexual propagation (such as cuttage, layerage, etc. ) to develop rattan forest. The distance between each rattan planting varies from 10 to 20 meters.

(3) Maintenance: The rattan seeding planted in the field are carefully protected from operations of cutting trees and burning of the field when plants crop ever year.

(4) Harvesting: Harvesting starts from 6 - 10 years after planting, when the rattan stem reaches 6 - 7 meters in length. Normally, rattan are selective harvested once every 3 or 5 years for small and large-diameter rattan.

3.2.2 Sangpabawa-Selective Harvesting and Conservation of Rattan

In Hani language, community rattan protected forest called " Sangpabawa". "Sangpa" means headman of the local community, "ba" means place or hill, "wa" means rattan, thus "Sangpabawa" is a protected rattan forest which belonging to the whole community and supervised by headman of the village or community in terms of management.

"Sangpabawa" in Mengsong was established almost one hundred years ago. The total forest-land of "Sangpabawa", was 333 hectares in 1950, which is belonging to the government, but forest management, including extraction of rattan and other minor products from " Sangpabawa", is decided by the headman on Page 4 of 7

behalf of all villages in this community.

There are some unique harvesting practices in this community, which includes:

(1) Methods: Under the local practice of extracting rattan canes from the forest, farmers selective harvest once every 5 years during the dry season for rattan "Dahong" (large to medium-diameter rattan, such as nambariensis var. xishuangbannaensis, C. nambariensis var. mengiongensis, C. nambariensis var. alpinus and C. obovoideus) , and once in 3 years for rattan "Lei" (small-diameter rattan, e.g. C. yunnanensis, C. yunnanensis var. densiflorus, and C. yunnanensis var. intermedius) (Chen et al. 1993).

(2) Time: Villagers prefer harvesting rattan in dry season based on rattan drying and less damage of either wound rotting or drowning of new shoots which sprout after cutting.

(3) Yield: Each year, about 10 tons of canes are harvested from almost one-third of rattan clump of the forest land; thus, harvesting in a three or five years cycle is practiced by Hani villages. On the other hand, since selective harvesting has been done, they avoid some damage: immature canes are cut and roots destroyed

There are other stipulations of an agreement to manage and protect this forest

1. Cutting of trees and heavy clearance is not allowed in the forest. The prevailing management practices do not permit the natural forest vegetation to be disturbed, and leads to increased production of canes. 2. One single cane would be offered to each household for making ploughing tools in each spring; 3. Several rattan stems will be provided each year to each Hani village for making swinging ropes for "Yeku", the traditional festival day of Hani people observed in July; 4. When villages construct a new house for their families, each household will be allowed to collect some canes (weighing as much as 25 kg) for house construction.

These stipulations both satisfy the urgent demand of villager and efficient protect the forest.

Some incidental effects of "s system are:

1. Biodiversity conservation: Sangpabawa system, not only protects the bamboo and rattan resource, but also conserve other plant resource, such as sonic valuable plants species. For example, Calophyllum polyanthum is well preserved in this forest, this species is listed in the Red List of China. 2. Water source: Sangpabawa is very important conservation forest of water resources for paddy field and drinking water. 3. Landscape: From the aesthetic viewpoint, this forest also is good landscape forest.

3.3 System's sustainability

3.3.1 Social Sustainability

Sangpabawa was classified as state owned forest to be managed by local community as a community forest, the local community will use their traditional guidelines to manage this resource. This management model is very efficient based on the local people consideration of this resource as their own property to protect and reasonable utilize.

3.3.2 Economic Sustainability

Firstly, rattan harvesting and output is stable, because the selective harvesting does not disturb the roots system, and the rattan can continue to grow, new shoots grow out from the old rootstock. The new shoots on the old rootstock produce mature, harvestable cane faster than newly planted rattan. Secondly, their practices avoid overcutting. High prices have led to pressure to over-cut, but in the Hani harvesting system, since the protection role of Sangpabawa and the support role of "Dongya" system, a balanced rattan harvesting is enhanced that meets the demand of the market. In the Dongya system, bamboo and rattan species are rather important components and constitute with other crops like tea, tree, vegetable and medical plant, etc. a diverse, highly productive agroecosystem. According to the practice from (Godoy and Feaw, 1991), rattan is about eight times more profitable than the most lucrative crop-padi, and about 15 times more profitable than rubber. From a management point of view the systems enhances "maximization of resources in which the satisfaction of the demand of the market and sustainable use the resources is combined. The supportable and complementary role of the Sangpabawa and Dongya systems will constitute a stable, sustainable and diversified agroecosystem. From the farmer's viewpoint, they obtain different production from Page 5 of 7

two systems to satisfy their cash need (such as harvesting and selling the rattan, bamboo and fruit, etc. ) as well as basic needs (such as rice, medical plants, and other crops).

3.3.3 Ecological Sustainability

In Sangpabawa system, plants species are well-protected, because of selective harvesting of rattan that conserves the growing environment of plants.

4. Development model

Peters (1994) states that the sustainable harvest of non-timber resources requires a bit more than "blind faith" in the productive capacity of tropical plants. It requires careful selection of species, resources and sites.

Silvicultural forms and managed model are interrelated elements that directly affect the developers of bamboo and rattan cultivation. There are some plantation models that can be chosen in future development:

1. Common teak + rattan: " has good experimentation results in Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanic Garden. 2. Rubber + rattan. In Indonesia, farmers intercrop rattan and rubber, the latter completely overgrows the former, which receive some profit (Godoy and Feaw, 1991 ). intercrops rattan with rubber in 1050 ha (DEPTH news, 1993), and although the grow of rattan under rubber is fantastic, there are some problems in this model, such as die damaging effect of rattan on the grown of rubber, decrease the latex production of rubber arcs, difficult harvesting of rattan, etc. It is recommended to experiment with inter- cropping overgrowing rubber with rattan in farm lands. 3. Rattan + rare timber tree: Rattan could be planted with some rare timber trees in tropical areas of Yunnan, such as intercropping rattan with Paramichelia bailloni. 4. Bamboo + rattan + crops - cultivated bamboo in the swidden lands, and planted rattan using the bamboo clumps as support for die climbing rattan. Tobacco is intercropped among the bamboo clumps. The bamboo branch or culm is sometimes burned and the ash is used to fertilize tobacco (Wang Kanglin, 1999). In Dai villages, some rattan species have been planted in bamboo gardens. 5. Rattan and bamboo Swidden system: as above mention, the "Qeiya-Aneya" and "Qeiya-Apeya" upland rice-rattan bamboo swidden cultivation is one of the major swidden components of the swidden farming system in Mengsong. 6. Homegarden: bamboo and rattan as important species planted in homegarden in indigenous communities of Xishuangbanna, both for paling plant and harvesting cans and young shoots as a vegetable.

5. Conclusion and recommendation

Based on Yunnan conditions, a series of developments could be activated, which include:

1. Establishment of management office: Forest department could establish a bamboo and rattan development office for corresponding finances and technology, and integrate the bamboo and rattan development projects in the national program on natural forest conservation and poverty alleviation. This office could establish a large bamboo and rattan nursery cooperation with other research institutes for future development. 2. Bamboo and rattan cultivation as priority developed program: In some projects, such as in international supported or community-based development projects, it is recommended that bamboo and rattan cultivation is supported as a priority program. The project could provide some financial support for training and breeding , planting bamboo and rattan and individual management to farmers. 3. Encourage private companies to involve in the bamboo and rattan planting. With to the private company providing financial support and farmers doing the bamboo and rattan cultivation, the government should give more benefit to the development organization, related to land use, revenues and management. 4. Improved utilization techniques: Present harvesting and processing methods are wasteful, it is therefore needed to introduce some techniques on bamboo and rattan processing (including methods and design) and preservation. Usually developing products with improved and more modern designs may help to find new markets and benefit the producer. Page 6 of 7

In additional, property right, land tenure and financial support are important elements that directly effect the reasonable use, efficient conservation and sustainable development of bamboo/rattan resources. The government, local or national, need to draft some reasonable policies, like:

1. It is very important that who plants will also benefit. Consummate village regulations to preserve collective bamboo/rattan forests and private bamboo/rattan gardens. 2. Designate some lands from collective, national secondary forest and buffer zones of nature reserves to develop rattan planting. This means that the plantation land belongs to the government, but it is controlled and managed by the community under village miles and regulations. 3. Financial support: The government should provide some financial support to programs on natural forest conservation and poverty alleviation to encourage bamboo and rattan cultivation. 4. Formulate policy, such as to provide the planter who develops elite bamboo/rattan species with favorable pokey, to levy resources taxes on the management of bamboo/rattan resources and give some kind of awards to the bamboo/rattan cultivators.

References

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Chen Sanyang, Pei Shengji and Xu Jianchu. 1993. Indigenous management of the rattan resources in the forest lands of mountain environment: the Hani practice in the Mengsong area of Yunnan, China. Ethnobotany, 5: 93 - 99.

Chopra, K. 1993. The value of non-timber forest products: an estimation for tropical deciduous forests in India. Economic Botany, 47(3): 251 -257

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Wang Kanglin. 1999. Classification, utilization and conservation of bamboo species (Gramineae: Babusoideae) in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan Province, Southwest China. Ph. D dissertation, University of the Los Banos, xix + 170 pp.

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Williams, J. T., J. Dransfield, P.M. Ganapathy, W. Liese, S. M. Nor and C. B. Sastry. 1991. Research needs for bamboo and rattan to the year 2000. Report Submitted to IDRC by the Tropical Tree Crops Program, International Fund for Agricultural Research, April 1991 Second printing, August 1994, Funded by the international Network for Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR). Page 7 of 7

Notes

1 The project supported by Ford Foundation and Yunnan Province Government

2 Kunming Institute of Botany, The Chinese Academy, of Sciences, 650204 Kunming, P.R, China