A BUFFER ZONE FOR BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION - VIABILITY OF THE CONCEPT IN NEPAL ROYAL CHITWAN-NATIONAL-PARK

A buffer zone for RCNP is considered an effective means to mitigate an d contain the Park-local people conflict. Its creation adjacent to the National Park will enable local people to engage in multiple use acti vities that will provide benefits not only to themselves but protect t he Park's integrity as well. Except for the much-degraded Barandabar F orest, the other small parcels of forest that exist around the Royal C hitwan National Park are highly inadequate to provide additional wildl ife protection and environmental conservation. RCNP does not have any area that, to date, is exclusively designated as a buffer zone. The Ba randabar Forest is still envisaged as an additional protection to the Park, although continual grazing, lopping of branches and twigs from t rees, and timber extraction, by the local people, have extensively dim inished its biological values. Before our survey, the majority of loca l people did not have any idea of a buffer zone and its potential bene fits. When briefed elaborately, very few people seemed to be optimisti c about its feasibility. The Rapti river-banks were indicated as the p otential areas. The southern riverbank could be developed as an extend ed habitat for large animal wildlife, while the northern bank could be developed as a 'socio-buffer'. However, two practical cons traints, n amely frequent flooding and ownership of barren land, will have to be resolved if the Rapti river-banks are to be converted into a buffer zo ne. Adjoining these would be the existing Barandabar Forest, whose pro per restoration, control, and management, are indispensable. The local people indicated fodder and firewood as their main criteria for the e stablishment of a buffer zone, followed by flooding which was a major problem in the vicinity of RCNP. Some examples in the study-area illus trated that local people had been capable of managing natural resource s by themselves. It was emphasized that local people should be put in charge of managing the buffer zone - especially those to whom conserva tion seemed a natural, inborn concern. In the event of its establishme nt, many local people were willing to assume a shared management respo nsibility. Their willingness was determined by their age, level of edu cation, volume of crop-loss, household size, and land-holding size. St rong support from the concerned government agencies is very important indeed, as they will have to provide technical guidance. Bestowing the responsibility upon a high-level authority would be unwise, as the lo cal people would most probably perceive it as yet another restriction imposed on their traditional rights for example to use the Barandabar Forest. A small-scale and less detailed buffer zone project would be f easible, that would be facilitated by people's support in the long run , relying on local initiative and mobilizing extant institutional mech anisms to perform related activities. The use of GIS technology has be come widely prominent in spatial modelling. It can contribute signific antly to identifying and delineating a buffer zone for a protected are a, taking into consideration several complex biophysical and socio-eco nomic criteria. The interplay of these criteria in a GIS context could produce several alternatives for planning and designing a buffer zone for RCNP.