Using Blockchain Technology and Sharing Culture to Promote Sustainable Forest Management in Tribal Communities

Abstract

Forest protection is crucial to ensuring the balance between human beings and ecology. This study explores the key role played by communities that originally lived in forest-protected areas in implementing the traditional management of forests. The unified management mode previously used by the state power can no longer meet the demands of modern times; hence, multiple types of management systems should be implemented to enable adaption to the original ecology of forest areas. A multimodal management mode should be adopted to restore the original ecology of forest areas. The adoption of this management system can restore a forest to its original state (i.e., the state that existed prior to the entry of state power). The forest has been in a state of ecological balance involving numerous species since ancient times. However, in the modern field of science, the passive restoration of a community’s self-governance ability could be unsustainable and unstable. To improve this situation, blockchain technology can first be used to improve the community management of a forest, such that the capabilities of the original local community can be improved; second, tourism promotion benefits both the community and the forest. When a community in a forest develops the tourism industry with the support of blockchain technology, the information and resources of all parties can be widely connected with the larger world, and this considerably increases success rates; finally, the traditional spiritual culture of a community, such as the culture of sharing, should be promoted. In addition to the skillful utilization of technology, culture can improve the traditional forest management ability of tribal communities who live in native forest areas in terms of their personality traits. Overall, we conclude that: against the evolution history of the over one hundred years, the adoption of new technology for forest management is inherently a creative innovation for the tribal community’s entrepreneurial development.