Policy versus reality in the Lao forestry sector

This article is concerned with the newest incarnation of community forestry in Laos, called “participatory sus-tainable forest management,” or PSFM. In essence, this type of community forestry stipulates that villagers living in and around forest areas deline-ated for timber production are given the opportunity to be in-volved with forestry planning and operations, and are entitledto a fixed percentage of the pro-ceeds from timber sales.