Forest dependency and rural livelihood—A study in Paschim Medinipur District, West Bengal

Non Timber Forest Products (NTFPs) are a collection of biological resources derived from natural and managed forest. NTFPs play significant role in rural livelihoods for a significant crucial portion of poor tribal populations in many parts of India. The present paper investigates the dependence of rural households on NTFPs in the district of Paschim Medinipur in West Bengal. The paper also attempts to find the disparities in forest earnings between different income groups with particular emphasis on income from NTFPs. We have used primary data collected from 158 households from 7 Forest Protection Committees (FPCs) in Garhbeta I Block of Paschim Medinipur district in West Bengal in India. This paper reveals that households in forest-fringe areas are highly dependent on NTFPs for maintaining their livelihoods. The result shows that dependency of household on NTFPs varies between income groups. Also we find that dependency of households on NTFPs depend significant on the factors like value of land, households size, number of days going to forest, number of forest goers and income diversification of the households.