Relationship between forest road length and village development during three decades in Neka-Zalemrood forest

Forest roads are built to facilitate the transport of personnel and wood, and so to promote village development. In this study 18 development indices of village in relation to increasing forest road density were evaluated during three decades for the villages of Aryam, Estakhrposht, Hosein Abad, Daram, Sarm and Darzikola in Neka-Zalemrood forest. According to the National Population and Housing Census of Iran (NPHCI), the rank of zero was considered for cases when a village did not have a specific facility and the rank of one was considered for cases when a village had a specific facility and service. The total length of forest roads was measured on maps from the years 1986, 1996 and 2006. Results showed that the total length of built roads at the end of 1986, 1996 and 2006 was 7, 25 and 36 km, respectively. Index of development in the village of Estakhrposht and Daram was positive at the end of the second decade whereas the villages of Estakhrposht, Daram, Aryam and Darzikola with ranks of 1.494; 0.053; 0.293 and 0.053 had positive development index in the third decade. The index of development in other villages was still negative at the end of 2006. The villages of Sarm and Daram enjoyed 5 and 7 services and facilities, respectively, in the second decade. So, their development index increased from -0.3 to 0.06 for Sarm and from -0.3 to 0.17 for Daram. 7.5 km of forest roads in the village of Estakhrposht were asphalted in the third decade (1996-2006) and the village of Estakhrposht enjoyed 18 development indices in total.