Research overview: buffer-zone governance and community forestry in tiger landscapes

This overview synthesises how buffer-zone management and community forestry mediate human-tiger and human-leopard conflict around protected areas in Nepal and India. It reviews programs that share park revenue, support predator-proof corrals and alternative livelihoods, and empower community forest user groups to manage resources and conflict, aiming to align local interests with conservation. The literature examines evidence on whether such arrangements reduce depredation, retaliation, and forest dependence while improving tolerance, and the equity and governance challenges involved. The survey frames buffer-zone and community-forestry institutions as central to coexistence at protected-area edges, illustrating how devolved governance and benefit-sharing can transform the relationship between border communities and the big cats next door.