Non-timber forest products (NTFP), which include hundreds of traded and locally used forest products of biological origin, employ millions of collectors, village traders and exporters in Nepal. Every year about 10,000 to 15,000 tons of more than 100 species of NTFPs are commercially harvested and traded from the mid-hills and high mountains of Nepal (Edward 1996). The forestry share of the GDP is estimated at 15 %( HMGN, 1989). The people in rural and uplands of Nepal live in and around forests are highly dependent on to get a part of their livelihood from NTFPs.
The increasing commercial demand for the non- timber forest products found in Nepal presents an economically and socially viable means of assisting hills/mountain communities in controlling the transition from subsistence to a cash economy. A number of recent national policy statements have emphasized the potential role of NTFPs resources base in controlling to poverty alleviation, economic growth and, occasionally, improved natural resources management.
Rapti hill of Nepal is the habitat of high value NTFPs. People inhabiting in these hills have traditionally been collecting different NTFPs from private forests, community forests and government forests. There are several challenges and constraints in the marketing of collected NTFPs to increase the income and employment opportunities for the forest dependent rural people.
It has been attempted to explore the existing markets of major tradable NTFPs with value chain perspectives. This study has utilized method to examine the path through which NTFPs pass from conservation, cultivation and harvesting to the final processor. The collectors are deprived of getting actual prices of their products as the NTFPs market is trader dominated. There are several middlemen associated with NTFPs marketing. The long and secretive marketing chain is inefficient and costly from the perspective of collectors. There are various technical, economic, marketing, institutional and legal obstacles in the cultivation and marketing of NTFPs in the region. The collectors' knowledge base about the final price, final consumer and final destination of their products is very poor.
The study has attempted to explore the promotion of potential NTFPs, develop common facility centre, organizing the NTFPs collectors, promotion of NTFPs based enterprises which can increase local and rural income and employment opportunities in the region.
