TY - JOUR
T1 - Opportunities and barriers for wood-based infrastructure in urban Himalayas
T2 - A review of selected national policies of Nepal
AU - Saxena, Alark
AU - Buettner, William Cole
AU - Kestler, Loker
AU - Kim, Yeon Su
N1 - Funding Information:
Efforts should be made to strengthen the linkages between National Disaster Risk Reduction policies and Nepal's Forest rights act to increase CFUG participation in providing locally sourced wood material that incentivizes construction of WBI to increase resilience to earthquakes. WBI construction should be directly linked to Nepal's climate commitments from the perspective of increased carbon sequestration and avoidance of emissions by replacing energy-intensive and environmentally destructive construction materials with low-energy and renewable wooden materials. Linkages between WBI and DRR can create opportunities for increased funding from Green Climate Fund, multilateral funds, and other bilateral donors. Nepal's FTTA should prioritize WBI by providing incentives for collaboration between technology providers internationally and private entrepreneurs within Nepal Forestry.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022
PY - 2022/6
Y1 - 2022/6
N2 - Nepal is a landlocked developing nation in a fragile mountain landscape vulnerable to seismic activity. The 2015 Gorkha earthquake highlighted how systemic social issues, such as poverty, rural-to-urban migration, and weak governance, exacerbate devastating impacts of natural disasters. Building wood-based infrastructure (WBI) can increase rural livelihoods through sustainable forest management and reduce rural-to-urban migration, while improving resilience of building and other infrastructure through use of wood. WBI can help Nepal achieve disaster risk reduction (DRR) goals while also reducing greenhouse gas emission and increasing carbon sequestration. We reviewed Nepal's policy landscape to identify the opportunities and barriers for building WBI and increasing urban resilience. Nepal's major policies across wood supply chain from sources to end-products related to WBI were reviewed and analyzed. We found that policies aimed to address sustainable development, disaster risk reduction, and climate change support establishment of WBI while policies for forest conservation limiting forest harvesting, as well as lack of clarity in policies and their implementation, creates barriers. We argue that Nepal's policies for forest conservation should be revised to allow sustainable forest harvesting and create more employment opportunities and income for rural communities to take advantage of expanded opportunities made available through WBI.
AB - Nepal is a landlocked developing nation in a fragile mountain landscape vulnerable to seismic activity. The 2015 Gorkha earthquake highlighted how systemic social issues, such as poverty, rural-to-urban migration, and weak governance, exacerbate devastating impacts of natural disasters. Building wood-based infrastructure (WBI) can increase rural livelihoods through sustainable forest management and reduce rural-to-urban migration, while improving resilience of building and other infrastructure through use of wood. WBI can help Nepal achieve disaster risk reduction (DRR) goals while also reducing greenhouse gas emission and increasing carbon sequestration. We reviewed Nepal's policy landscape to identify the opportunities and barriers for building WBI and increasing urban resilience. Nepal's major policies across wood supply chain from sources to end-products related to WBI were reviewed and analyzed. We found that policies aimed to address sustainable development, disaster risk reduction, and climate change support establishment of WBI while policies for forest conservation limiting forest harvesting, as well as lack of clarity in policies and their implementation, creates barriers. We argue that Nepal's policies for forest conservation should be revised to allow sustainable forest harvesting and create more employment opportunities and income for rural communities to take advantage of expanded opportunities made available through WBI.
KW - Earthquake resilience
KW - Forest policy
KW - Mountain landscapes
KW - Rural livelihoods
KW - Urbanization
KW - Wood based infrastructure
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U2 - 10.1016/j.tfp.2022.100244
DO - 10.1016/j.tfp.2022.100244
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85128288876
SN - 2666-7193
VL - 8
JO - Trees, Forests and People
JF - Trees, Forests and People
M1 - 100244
ER -