Forest or Farm?

This book is about the political economy of poverty and land hunger in Nepal. It suggests that the historically evolved unequal distribution of cultivated land across tenure classes, and in particular the existence of extremely small units of land held by a majority of the farmers—combined with declining yields and population growth—has produced a gradual process of landlessness. At the same time, the overwhelmingly rural economy, the seasonal nature of agricultural wage, employment, and low wage rates have made attractive as well as self-perpetuating the desire to become a ‘land-holding’ peasant among the rural poor. One consequence of this situation has been the high level of migration and spontaneous land settlement in forest areas in the Nepal Tarai, where prospects for land settlement are still substantial. But recent state policies emphasize forest protection and the sealing off of this ‘last’ agricultural frontier. The landless and propertyless migrants, even after having settled for a considerable period, are hence subjected to constant official intimidation, frequently accompanied by the destruction of their homes and crops, and eviction from their settlements. This work describes the hopes and frustrations of these people with respect to their aspirations to land, as well as examines the rationality of present land-use policies.