Livelihood Pattern and Forest Dependence of the Major Tribes in Rangamati, Bangladesh

Indigenous people are of great interest and intense significance from forest perspective, as they inhabit for a very long time over the same region. In Bangladesh, tribal communities reside with close touch of forests and thus, quite dependent on it. That’s why, it of tremendous importance to study their Do’s and Don’ts in order to propose better forest and environmental management interventions considering options for enhancing livelihoods of the indigenous communities in Bangladesh. In this research, four major tribes of Rangamati in four sites have been purposively selected for questionnaire survey. Data has been taken into consideration from two vital viewpoint, livelihood pattern and forest dependence, assuming that all tribes are dependent on forest resources for their livelihood. And it is found that, Tanchangya and Chakma community are more economically well-off in terms of land ownership and income per capita respectively. Forestry practice provides little share in their total income though Tanchangya community has the highest land per capita in forestry sector as well as in agricultural sector. On the other hand, Marma community’s living standard is comparatively low as their income and land per capita is low, and they are more dependent on forest. Tripura community keeps the comparative middle status in almost every sector. A variety of other social and environmental factors were also collected and thoroughly analyzed here which can be very useful for further study.OtherShinshu University International Symposium 2010 : Sustainable Agriculture and Environment : Asian Networks II 　信州大学国際シンポジウム2010 : 持続的農業と環境 : アジアネットワークII ― アジアネットワークの発展をめざして―. 信州大学農学部, 2010, 45-58conference pape