Introduction
Forests provides seasonal income to around 200 million forest-dependent communities in India. For generations, these communities have nurtured a strong relationship with nature that sustains their household as well as the local trade. A major chunk of population dependent on these Seasonal Forest Products (SFPs) is the tribal communities. These forest products have cultural, economic and medicinal relevance for these communities with women emerging as the primary, and in many cases the sole collectors of SFPs. Yet their role remains invisible, informal, and rarely receive recognition as economic actors or decision-maker in the market supply chain.
This leaves women’s labour undervalued and reinforces their dependence on middlemen who facilitate transaction of SFPs between communities and industries. Through support from the Initiative on the Forest Economy (IoFE) programme at the Indian School of Business, this reality is beginning to shift as they are organising themselves into community enterprises in the form of Forest-based Producer Companies (PCs). Through these collective enterprises, women from these forest dependent communities are redefining the gender roles, work and their identities.
Status of Forest Economy
Despite women remain central to the collection and processing of SFPs using their Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), they continue to remain marginalised due to structural challenges. This marginalisation is further reinforced by the male-dominated PCs in India, which have remained historically male and agriculture focussed. Forests remain largely governed through a conservation-centric lens while the sustainable livelihoods remain invisible and even if forest-dependents are involved in selling of these seasonal forest products informally, leaving little attention to women-owned forest-based PCs. Men typically control transportation of products to the markets, negotiation and bargaining of the products with the middlemen or traders, and formal market networks. This leaves women excluded in supply chain restricting their income potential and economic autonomy, even though they contribute their labour in collection and processing of the forest products. Additionally, the women remain excluded in leadership role and lack capacity building of these women in PCs. This imbalance keeps tribal women at bottom of the pyramid.
Women-owned PCs respond to this gap by formalising a value chain tailored to forest products, placing women at its centre where they are already the primary economic actors in collection and processing. Through collectivisation and volume-based trade, these PCs strengthen bargaining power, enable direct engagement with large-scale buyers, and support entry into formal contracts, helping women build viable and sustainable forest-based businesses. In addition, forest-dependent communities face institutional challenges such as lack of storage, infrastructure, which impacts the product quality and make it difficult for such enterprises to sustain and scale. Forming PCs in the forest-value chain requires a different framework and model that focuses on aggregation from numerous small-scale collectors rather than bulk procurement from a few farmers.
Formal Market Supply: Creating Space for Women-owned Forest Producer Companies (PCs)
Forest-based Producer Companies can offer a transformative platform for reimagining the forest economy by formalising women’s role in the supply chain in the form of shareholder, owners of their company, leaders, economic actors and not only as a collector of SFPs. This step is significant in collectivising women and enhancing women’s participation in the forest economy who historically remained confined as a labourer enmeshed in the informal forest supply chain.
These PCs focuses on collective scale by creating platforms for aggregation of products at scale, bargaining prices by engaging directly with the buyers, reducing per-unit cost and improving efficiency. Instead of selling to different traders in a small batch of SFPs, now they are able to sell in large quantities with standardised quality with the scope of negotiation. Moreover, women-owned PCs disrupt the traditional forest trade allowing them for better and timely payments and transparent transactions. Beyond economic benefits, these PCs play pivotal role in capacity building on financial literacy, compliances with regulatory frameworks, packaging, sorting and grading of the SFPs for ensuring quality. Women-owned PCs also ensure ecological sustainability by following their TEK such as rules and regulations on collecting SFPs at the particular time of the season, collecting ripen product only for natural regeneration, and fines and punishments for offender. Women-owned forest producer companies in states such as Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand and Odisha are enabling tribal women to reclaim control, negotiate fairer prices and reshape their identities as leaders and entrepreneurs.
Emerging Field Insights from Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand and Odisha
The field experiences in various locations of IoFE’s operation illustrates an emerging example of setting forest economy model. This model is reshaping women’s role in the supply chain and gender dynamics beyond their social boundaries with the balance between livelihoods and ecological sustainability.
In Himachal Pradesh, rough terrain and poor connectivity had allowed middlemen to dominate the SFPs trade, often controlling prices, and delay in payment or no payments. The Pir Panjal Jungle Producer Company (PPJPC) owned by women have begun to reverse this dynamic. Women of PPJPC have secured better prices, by aggregating products and negotiating collectively. For instance, they fetch increasing returns from selling Wild Hazelnuts by selling to a premium and retail outlet in Hyderabad called Dry Fruitz Basket. They generated around ₹35 Lakhs including GST from a collective sale of 1192 Kgs (11.9 Quintals). These transactions are now marking a significant shift from informal trade to organised market participation by adhering to tax-regulations.
In Jharkhand, the Sona Buru Janta Producer Company (SBJPC) marked a historic milestone in June 2025 with its first direct industrial sale. They sold 44.5 tonnes of Sal seeds worth ₹1.43 million to AAK India. SBJPC were supported by FarMart in supply chain logistics and risk capital. This transaction validated both women’s collective capacity to deliver at an industrial scale and also ensured transparent benefit-sharing. The revenue generated was transferred directly to Gram Sabhas by keeping in mind of the forest protection, fire prevention, and tree plantation, reinforcing the link between livelihood, wealth generation and conservation.
In Odisha, many SFPs were earlier sold only in local markets and Haats and remained largely undervalued. The creation of community-level, women-owned forest, Green Shakti Producer Companies (GSPCs) have enabled these products to enter formal industrial supply chains. By aligning local procurement with industrial needs, communities have unlocked new value such as the commercial sourcing of Karanj seeds, previously unknown to villagers for their industrial use, now supplied to firms like Terviva for sustainable aviation fuel, cattle feed, oil, etc. The Directors and members of the GSPCs also comprise of women from Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG).
Together, these experiences highlight how women-owned forest Producer Companies are not only improving market access and incomes but also embedded in the values of sustainability, community ownership and governance in the forest economies.
Conclusion: A New Beginning for Tribal Communities and Forest Economies
The formalisation of forest value chain through women-owned Forest Producer Companies allows tribal women to enter markets as equal economic contributors, moving beyond their traditional role as informal SFPs collectors. women are able to embed their traditional ecological knowledge directly into enterprise decision-making, as owners, leaders and directors of the PCs. Deeper participation in both economic and community-level governance is facilitated by the leadership roles, combined with capacity building in finance, legal compliance and market engagement which strengthen women’s confidence, agency and collective voices.
Furthermore, increased profitability through fair pricing, transparent transactions, and access to formal markets creates strong incentives for forest conservation. As their livelihoods depend on long-term forest health, women-owned enterprises actively promote sustainable harvesting practices to ensure regeneration and future gains. Amid intensifying climate change, market volatility, and livelihood precarity, these models offer a scalable approach that aligns economic empowerment with ecological sustainability.
Through the appropriate policy recognition, institutional support, and multi-partnerships with industry, these women-owned forest PCs can strengthen economic power, enhance local governance, and foster resilient forest economies across regions such as Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, also expanding to other forest-dense states. This signals a shift where forests are not only conserved but also sustain dignified and inclusive livelihoods.
* Note: This blog includes 20 % AI-generated content.
Author’s Bio:
Yamini is working as a Governance Specialist with the Initiative on the Forest Economy at Bharti Institute of Public Policy, Indian School of Business. She handles field operations in Himachal Pradesh with a focus on formalising women’s participation in the forest economy and securing tenure. She is also a member of Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) team where she is documenting the field experiences in the form of various knowledge products. Before joining the initiative, she worked as an intern with Bharti Institute for documenting the Lakhpati Kisan initiative, as one of the co-authors. She holds a Master’s in Social Work, specialising in women-centred practice from Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai.