Sacred Groves: The Consequence of Traditional Management

Table 2

Levels of sustainability of sacred groves.

	Economic concerns		Societal concerns		Environmental (ecological) concerns
	Unsustainable	Sustainable	Unsustainable	Sustainable	Unsustainable	Sustainable
Biodiversity values (faunal and floral)	Destruction of habitat and poaching of species for economic reasons.	Conservation of indigenous plant species for their option value; consumptive and productive value of resources.	Exploitation by outside people for various uses such as a picnic spot.	Understanding the concept of intellectual property rights (IPR). Sustainability of resources by local traditional forest communities.	Loss of biodiversity at all levels, leading to destruction of sacred grove which is responsible for loss of overall ecosystem integrity.	Need for better management by establishing Community Conserved Areas (CCAs).
	Increasing cost of land for urbanization overuse for pharmaceuticals.	Extraction of forest products should be limited to permit adequate regeneration.	Wild flowers used in rituals.	Traditions that safeguard the forest should be encouraged.	Due to deforestation and degradation, the biodiversity of the area is adversely affected.	Stringent implementation of laws and Biodiversity Act 2004.
	Overexploitation of forest products for extensive use of timber and nontimber forest product (NTFP).	Carrying capacity of the forests must not be exceeded.	Local people or traditional forest dwellers are deprived of their rights over the forest.	Limited use of detritus for rural energy.		Better management through local involvement by establishing CCAs.
				Plantations of local species. Ecodevelopment of surrounding village.		Use of locale specific ecorestoration and ecotourism to reduce threat.
Surrounding land use (grazing, fodder)	Unsustainable change in land use pattern due to short term economic gain. Land speculation.	Land use pattern should be such that environmental concerns are addressed.	No land for local tribal-forest dwellers who are deprived of their traditional rights over the forest.	Use of concepts and programmes like community reserves, joint forest management (JFM), and ecodevelopment.	Loss of precious biodiversity, increase in deforestation, increase in wastelands.; Urban sprawl leading to poverty.	Linkages to regional Protected Area Network; ecorestoration of degraded landscape and formation of corridor forest.
Agriculture	Intensive agriculture, depending on cash crops. Change in cropping pattern for short term economic gain, for example, cultivation of sugarcane and use for Japanese technique for rice cultivation.	Traditional agricultural systems that permit a wide range of produce to be grown and marketed throughout the year.	Farmers receive economic incentives to grow cash crops for national and international market, rather than to supply local nutritional needs.	Traditional hill slope agriculture (nachni, varai, etc.) should be encouraged as it is an insurance against the failure of one crop.	Reduction in soil fertility due to change in traditional techniques; high risk of drought and flood conditions, desertification due to overgrazing, fire, change in land use to urban settings.	Mix crops or crop rotation should be practiced to maintain the soil fertility and proper selection of the crops depending upon the soil structure and restriction of grazing areas should be implemented.
Pilgrimage	Overexploitation of fuel wood during annual fest.	Offer of money to the deity which is helpful for maintenance of the sacred grove.	Enormous increase in the number of tourists and pilgrims.	Control on negative activities of tourists and pilgrims.	Solid waste pollution of plastic, wrappers, and so forth.	Ecotourism training.
						Initiatives for; local.