A review of the role of property rights and forest policies in the management of the Sundarbans Mangrove Forest in Bangladesh

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to critically evaluate past forest management policies and property rights regimes in achieving sustainability of the Sundarbans Mangrove Forest (SMF) in Bangladesh. The adequacy of forest policies to reflect regimes of property rights in their design and implementation is examined using content analysis. The analysis synthesises forest policies of four distinct historical time periods, and the embedding of property rights during those periods using Schlager and Ostrom's typology. The findings reveal the inadequacy of the existing state property rights regime to secure the livelihood of 3.5 million people in marginalised and disadvantaged forest-dependent communities, and to achieve sustainability in the SMF by reversing the trend of rapid reduction of forest resources. The challenge, therefore, is to find an alternative property rights regime to address the missing link between conservation and livelihood-security of forest-dependent communities using sustainable management practices in the SMF.