Shrublands and grassland have been converted to more productive forest land while some of the least productive bari (gently sloping, rain-fed) terraces on steeper slopes have been abandoned and allowed to revert to shrubland and forest. Within the formerly degraded forests at lower elevations, qualitative improvements have occurred to the extent that the locally extirpated leopard and other animal species have returned, or increased in numbers. However, it is the areas closest to population centres [the most accessible, in other words] that have seen the most positive change. Here the efforts to foster community forestry have been most successful, partly the result of the long-term partnership between the local people, the Nepal-Australia Forestry Project, and the Nepalese Department of Forests.