What in a nutshell is Forest Management and how is it different from conventional or general management?

Forest Management, briefly, is about understanding forests or forestry as a sector, managing this sector and its natural resources and addressing the question of how you can provide livelihood to the nearly 15 million people comprising forest dwellers or forest fringe dwellers. What can you do for them in terms of enhancing their livelihood?

From here, we have to go in a triangular direction, which means that there is an environmental component, a sociological component and an economic component attached to Forest Management. How do you take care of the forest environment in terms of managing the resources? How do you undertake the development of the forest sector as an industry for economic activities? And while you are doing the above, how do you take care of the sociological dimension of the people who dwell there? So at IIFM’s two-year Post Graduate Program in Forest Management (PGPFM), we talk about these three important components.

In General Management, we usually talk about managing corporates, managing accounts, finances, human resources, marketing, organizational behavior, operations or systems and so on in the first year and then in the second year we teach them advanced courses based on these subjects.

In the Forest Management program, we teach a bit of all this and then in the second year we move on to specialization in the forestry sector, where it stands, implications of this sector, say for example carbon trading, Kyoto protocol, carbon sequestering, climatic change, global warming and so on. Besides this, students here also take specialized courses on say Corporate Social Responsibility.

So at the end of the two years, the students passing out of IIFM become employable as theme managers in the development sector. For every development, there is a price to be paid. They decide how one can set a balance between development and environmental degradation. They help large corporations work in a green way so in that sense they are Green Managers.

Can you give some examples of the job profiles that IIFM graduates take up?

Say, in the last year the highest international salary was Rs 20 lakhs and highest domestic salary was Rs 8 lakhs, both came from forest based industry. For example, Olam International took four students and gave them the Rs 20 lakhs salary. Some of our students are going for Microfinance, providing it for the livelihood of forest and forest-fringe dwellers and percolating the benefits of liberalization to rural areas. So some of our students are joining banks like ABN Amro or UTI Bank. These banks say that IIFM graduates have a good understanding of rural areas and its people and microfinance.

Then development organizations too are recruiting IIFM graduates for managing developmental projects. These organizations include Aradhana Foundation, Dorabjee Trust, UNICEF and others. The work here is related to formulating projects, doing the Project Risk Analysis, going about implementing these projects and getting the right results.

Some of our students have joined eco-tourism companies like Jungle Lodges and Resorts.

What profiles are IIFM students taking up in international companies like Olam International or in carbon trading companies?

One of our students is now working in Singapore on Clean Development Mechanisms and carbon trading under the Kyoto Protocol mechanisms. This student’s profile is to understand corporations involved in carbon trading, study their emissions data, collecting all that data, compiling it and showing whether the emissions are increasing or decreasing and then estimating what kind or amount of trade can take place. That’s one type of profile.

You mentioned about managing the economic, sociological and environmental aspects of Forest Management. Can you explain with some examples which electives in PGPFM’s second year curriculum help a student learn the required skills?

Let’s take for example, contribution of the forest sector to economy. We have been researching on how one can account for different kind of ecological services a forest can provide. The day is not far away when the charging or payback policy of ecological services would be in place especially with carbon trading and carbon sequestering coming in. So we have courses with heavy focus on these subjects.

The second thing is sociological dimension and corporate social responsibility. We are a strong proponent of the belief that corporate social responsibility is not just charity but is also strategic for the organization. So for example we know that the purchasing power of rural sector is low. So through corporate social responsibility, how can you do different and innovative activities to increase the purchasing power of villages?

In terms of environmental management, we teach them about sector specific policies, services, service charges, accounting mechanisms. Say for example, all large industries take raw material from forest areas, whether it is wood, coal or metals and create products using these ingredients. If you are taking these natural resources out continuously, how do you measure the environmental impact? That’s taught in the environmental auditing and assessment courses. Or take climate change. If you are doing a certain activity today without taking care of climatic effects, how is it going to affect the climate in the future? There are various models to measure this. We sensitize the students in these skills.

What entrepreneurship opportunities are there for Forest Management graduates?

Some of our students have become entrepreneurs of a different kind. Two of them have started NGOs, some have gone into agro-forestry, green manuring or watershed management. So these students have become social entrepreneurs.

What kind of background and profile do you prefer in students?

We use the CAT score for the basic short listing after which we call them to interview. Then at the time of the group discussion and interview we try to assess if the student is really interested in natural resource management. About 70 to 80 percent of the time we find that our assessment has been correct. Although there are students who try to be clever but most of them are truly concerned about the environment and are convinced that the inputs provided by IIFM will make them employable in the development sector. Eventually, the job satisfaction levels of IIFM graduates are incomparable to those of general management graduates. Because IIFM graduates are doing something directly for the people of this country, whether it is for natural resources or microfinance or rural livelihood.

How do you help students with non-botany or non-life sciences backgrounds to come up to the level of the environmental knowledge required to be a natural resource manager?

See, even if you take general management programs, students from engineering backgrounds have to be taught finance, accounting or operations in technical terms. The courses are designed to imbibe knowledge about these areas through well thought out processes.

So as you rightly mentioned botany or geology, forest managers don’t have to be much bothered about botanical studies, different type of plants or animals. We are more concerned about things like, how much non-timber forest products are available, what is their quantity, what kind of market do they have, what are their utility? Maybe a little about their botanical names, but not much. This much is easy to understand for students with any background.

What are the trips that your students take to National Parks and forests about?

We send the students for two organizational trip projects, as opposed to one organizational trip project in general management courses. Apart from that we send them to fieldwork components which are in every course. We send them to national parks, wildlife sanctuaries, nurseries or watershed management venues so that they get a first-hand experience of natural resource management.

During a trip to a national park, they get to see how a protected area is being managed. A protected area does not mean that there is a boundary wall around it. But it means that every tree inside the area should be maintained. So they get to see how man-animal conflicts get automatically resolved, how nature provides livelihood to forest dwellers. They also learn about business opportunities through eco-tourism.

Tell us about campus life at IIFM outside academics.

As you can see, our campus is located on a forested hill surrounded by three lakes and the entire Bhopal city is visible from here. So for students who like nature, half of their time passes exploring and understanding it on campus. Nevertheless, there are activities that encourage student interaction. Our Students’ Council is responsible for maintaining academic quality and running clubs like the Nature Club, Adventure Club, Sports Club or Cultural Club. That way, the student community ensures that we have a vibrating campus. They also run the mess and we don’t interfere there except for providing manpower and facilities.

Prof Bandopadhyay, thanks for the interview.

Thanks and I hope this interview helps students who want to take up forest management as a career and help save our natural resources.