Contribution of Forestry to Poverty Alleviation - APFNet

Community title
The solutions to problems related to forestry, land, and poverty need to go hand in hand. Under Abhisit
Vejjajiva’s government, the policy is to solve problems of landlessness among the poor by using the
mechanism of the Land Bank and expediting the process of issuing land rights in the form of Community
Title Deeds to poor farmers and communities in public land (in principle, these being degraded forest
areas). In principle, the issuing of Community Title Deeds is seen as a possible solution to addressing
issue of land rights.
A Regulation of the Office of the Prime Minister was announced and published in the Royal Gazette,
effective as of 12 June 2010. In this Regulation, “Community Title Deeds” by definition is a document
that entitles local communities to jointly manage and utilize land within the “public domains” that
would ensure security of settlement as well as usage of the land. Among the conditionalities for success
would be clearly defined boundaries. Although local communities have the freedom to manage land
and natural resources in ways that are compatible with the social-economic and environmental settings,
these must be consistent with the broader land-use guidelines as well as some of the obligations that
communities agreed to accept. Among these could be the agreement of communities to look after the
natural resources and the environment. The local communities must also adhere to the conditions
specified within the Regulation. Although the term Title Deed is used, members of local communities
will only be granted the rights to use and not the legal entitlements similar to that of private property
rights. Thus in principle, individual members are entitled to use land and resources only in so far as
they are members of the community.
The term “local community” refers to a group of people who have come together to participate in the
management of natural resources and have been in place not less than three years prior to 12 June 2010.
To launch this policy, the government has established an Office of Community Title Deed based in
the Office of the Prime Minister. Since the Regulation was announced, many local communities have
applied for Community Title Deeds. The land where applications were made for Community Title
Deeds ranges from public grazing land, land reform area, to even land where private property rights
with land tenure certificates (such as NS-3) were issued. But of particular interest are the applications
for Community Title Deeds and issued in land classified as National Forest Reserves, National Parks
and Wildlife Sanctuaries. In practice, there is more than what is recorded since there are applications
where it is unclear whether the particular land parcel is located in protected areas, state land, or other
types of public land. Even so, the total area requested added up to 92,774 ha, involving around 100
villages and around 19,000 households.
While most of the applications are from the northern region, Table X.8 shows that 51 of the 65
applications from this region come from a single province, Nan. Also of interest are the applications
from the northeastern region where two villages in Kalasin alone placed an application requesting the
issuance of Community Title Deeds for a combined area of around 25,000 ha.
Table X.8: Applications for community title deeds in protected areas
Region Province
Northern
North-
Eastern
Number of
villages
Area Population
Rai Hectare Household
Number of
people
Changmai 5 11,937 1,910 1,625 6,068
Phetchabun 3 5,161 826 463 1,896
Changrai 1 3,337 534 54 260
Maehongson 1 5,427 868 69 432
Lampang 2 3,609 577 116 522
Phayao 1 1,868 299 191 651
Tak 1 23,314 3,730 87 457
Nan 51 241,927 38,708 6,466 24,345
Total 65 296,580 47,453 9,071 34,631
Chaiyaphume 1 1,775 284 103 541
Ubonratchathai 4 304 5,170 827 183 833
Nakornratchasima 1 14,000
Burirum 2 24,246 3,879 1,170 2,022
Khon Kaen 2 45,667 7,307 1,679 6,446