Man Bahadur Chettri of Sarang Kot is aware of the gradual plunder of the forests and the evolution of cfm in his country. "For the rulers of Nepal, forests were an infinite source of revenue,' he says. The strategy varied from ruler to ruler. But there was only one agenda: commercial exploitation of forests.

Forests were cleared for revenue generation, both by selling timber and by converting it to agricultural land, which fetched land tax. Villagers were cutting firewood for cooking and heating purposes and farmers were clearing forests land for agriculture. Livestock pressure on forests was also increasing. The result: forest was moving away from the villagers. Accessible forest area was decreasing at a threatening rate. In 1985-86, the total accessible forest land was 5.8 million ha. It was reduced to 4.6 million ha in 1992-93 and in 1994-95 the figure plummeted to 3.1 million ha.

There was no forest regulation