a historical and sociological overview of the community forestry in albania

7/30/2019 A Historical and Sociological Overview of the Community Forestry in Albania

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Gazmend ZENELI, Jonida TARAJ, Haki KOLA

THE BOUNDARY DOES

NOT TWIST

A Historical and Sociological Overview

of the Community Forestry in Albania


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Liberty and forest laws are incompatible

INTRODUCTION

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Magna_Carta.jpg

These protests inspired, among other things, Karl Marxs first political writings

(Marx, 1842) and a memorable novel by Honore de Balzac capturing peasant

hostility to forest officials (de Balzac, 1900).

remarked an English country vicar, speaking on

behalf of villagers shut out of woodland reserved

for the exclusive use of the king, in 1720

(Thompson, 1720).

Indeed, the history of state forestry has been a

history of social conflict. In continental Europe,

the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

were peppered with social protest movements

against the state management of forests.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Magna_Carta.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Magna_Carta.jpg


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The social-political system also had a particularly Albania

aspect, namely the tribal system as recorded in the

Kanuni i Lek Dukagjinit.

This system probably evolved as a dynamic, social

response to the pressures of life in a frontier zone , and as

a response by the Albanian population to the pressures of

assimilation.

INTRODUCTION

Political power is vested in the person of the family patriarch (zot i shpise). Family

heads are appointed or elected to a village council (kuvend) that makes decisions

of importance to the whole community. A single council member is elected

headman or kryeplak. Several villages and fisi might be politically joined in a

bajrak(a banner) led by a bajraktar(a banner chief).

According to the Kanuni i Lek Dukagjinit, large households

(shpia), organized into neighborhoods (mehalla), share patrilineal descent from a

common apical ancestor thereby forming exogamous segmented clans (fisi).

Several neighborhoods andfisitogether compose a single village.


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INTRODUCTION

ALBANIA has been characterized by extremes over the last century, and

property rights in particular have undergone extreme changes

Although forests were officially mostly state-owned, in practice their use

was regulated by the customary norms

The rights were based on the recognition of specific areas as the property

of a particular group of brothers (vllazni), beyond that of a particular clan

(fis). Beyond a certain distance the forest was the common property (kujrit)of a village; beyond this of the bajrak (district).

In 1945, all forest became the property of the state. This includes every

form of copse, from the dwarf oaks and pine woods that border villages, to

the dense forests on the high slopes of the mountain ranges.

The disintegration of the state during the collapse of the communist

regime was dramatic and since 1991, Albania has pursued a process of

forestry reform.


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This study is based on an evaluative project, that piloted a participatory

approach to demarcating and mapping user rights and developing

management plans within the villages that make up a commune

This presentation aims on:

providing a historical overview of the relationship between man and

forest in Albania, focusing mainly in the sociological aspects of this

relationship,

evaluating changes in the attitudes of local communities in different

regions in Albania in regards to community (communal) forest land,

and,

evaluating where the field of community forestry is today in Albania.

INTRODUCTION


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Regions were chosen to be representative of the whole

country. Consideration of several factors such as:

the geographical location, total area and area covered by forest,

number of communes etc.

historical traditions especially in forest and pasture

ownership and management,

historical bias.

The district of Korca was chosen as the one

displaying the characteristics of the whole

southern region and due to the distinct

differences from other parts of the country inforest and pasture

The topography in this district is various; plain

fields, hills and mountain.

METHODOLOGY


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Puka represents more or less the traditions of Lezha, Shkodra, and Kukesi.

Located in Albanian Alps, the commune of Blerimi presents the typical

northern village with scattered houses that are usually apart from

each other and accessible only by rugged footpaths.

The area is commonly cited both in ethnographic literature and by Albanian

people today as having maintained more tribal customs than other districts

due to mountains locations and relative isolation from outside influence.

METHODOLOGY

Dibr, located in the mountainous northeast of Albania, is one of most poverty-

stricken regions of the country. In term of customs, family organization and

traditionaluse and management of forest, Dibra was chosen as an area

dominated by the Kanun ofScanderbeg

Elbasani was chosen to represent mountain region of central Albania in both

sides of Shkumbini River. The river has serves more or less as the boundary

between GhegandToske


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Community forestryis a village-level forestry activity, decided on

collectively and implemented on communal land, where local populations

participate in the planning, establishing, managing and harvesting offorest crops, and so receive a major proportion of the socio-economic and

ecological benefits from the forest (Martel and Whyte, 1992).

"Communityforestry, social forestry and rural development forestry

are more or less equivalent and reflect Abraham Lincoln's view of

democracygovernment of the people, by the people, for the

people (Burley, 2007) .

Transfer of state-owned lands to local governments has included forest

and pastures. The process of transfer goes through several stages.

The size and boundary lines of the areas are preliminary assigned to

each commune and subordinate village

COMMUNITY FORESTRY


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Village decides whether or not to

divide the communal forests andpastures.

It can happen that neighborhoods,

clans, or separate families may

request to use two or more plots.

COMMUNITY FORESTRY

If the village decides to divide them, then the village commission or a special

group selected by the village collects the requests or traditional claims of

neighborhoods, clans, group families or separate families about the forests

and pastures they have used in the past.


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In the region ofPuka:

In both villages, where an area of 12.7 ha pasture

was transferred (Dardhe and Trun) it was decided

that these areas should be used collectively.

While six out of the seven villages of the commune

decided to divide the high forest area on individual

users, the villager of Trun decided to haveeverything in communal use.

RESULTS

When was more than one the

user of the parcel, a sketch was

drawn, where the parcel is

divided by lines and in

each polygon there is a number,

indicating the user


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In the region ofDibra:

Conflicts and misunderstandings during the village

boundaries demarcations. Most of these conflicts

came from the fact that four villages are

daughters of Bazi and Karica created during the

communist era.

two forms of use are common in all the villages:collective use by the whole village and private use

by single families.

Shrubs are designated to be in collective use in all

the villages, while for high forest and coppices the

mode of use differs among the villages.

In Baz and Karice, there is a tendency of collective

use, while newly created villages tend more

towards the use by individual families.

RESULTS


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In the region ofElbasan:

a different mode of forest and pasture use.

all the villages decided that the pasture area of ca.

4000 ha should be used collectively.

the same stands true as far as the forest are

concerned. In the majority of the villages, it was

decided that all the forest transferred should be

used collectively and not divided to individuals

RESULTS


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In the region ofKorca:

Prior to the collectivization, the forests have been

treated as a common property administered by the

Village Council.

In 2002, forests and pastures are returned to the

commune and village use.

Following the methodology, demarcation of village

boundaries were carried out by the working groups.

Two forms of use are common in all the villages;

collective use by the whole village and private use

by single households. Shrubs are designated to bein collective use in all the villages, while for high

forest and coppices the mode of use differs among

the villages.

RESULTS


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DISCUSSION

In the communities surveyed, customary ownership is usually regulated at the

family level. The individuals of a family know their limited and traditional rights

to land and how it is to be used.

The sub-division of the communal forests and pastures that have been

transferred from state control reflects this reality.

The majority of plots are allocated on a per family basis; a lesser area is

allocated as common or village forest or as forest being attributed to an

individual. The allocation is usually made according to the old boundaries of

the properties as they were before 1945.

Everywhere, villagers have a strong feeling about their ownership on the forest,

that they consider as their property, based very often on ancestral use or on

even actual use.

This attitude is relatively independent of the actual status of the forest and

refers to the land and to the products themselves and not to the use.


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DISCUSSION

According to the social cohesion, the families (as the smaller unit) are

represented by one of their members, who has the authority to resolve the

conflicts linked with the allocation of natural resources. Usually, where this

social cohesion is strong , the families have maintained the traditional

knowledge and process to allocate their resources within

the village, even within the family.

When this cohesion is not so strong, the number of conflicts is higher and theprocess of resolving them takes longer. Villagers are trying to follow the same

approach as the one based on the tradition but negotiating the users rights on

base of their actual or past use of the resource.

There are rules governing behavior such that felled wood or bundles of firewood

marked by a stone (or cross-shaped sign the Catholic region), can be left

without risk of theft. It would be sinful (mkat) to touch this material as it is

obviously the fruit of someone elses labor.


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The discourse on forestry has to move towards a more

accommodationist perspective. Foresters and peasant need to talk

to, rather than talk past, each other.

A willingness to listen to and at least partially incorporate the

other point of view should replace the rigid and uncompromising

attitude of the past.

Within the forestry profession itself, skeptics doubt the

contemporary relevance of the custodial and policing approaches

previously followed.

It is time that governments to more seriously and sympathetically

consider the rights of forest-dependent communities

TAKE HOME MESSAGE

The common good is placed before private damage.

E mira e prbashkt i paravehet damit t veant


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a historical and sociological overview of the community forestry in albania

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