Maria C. J. Cruz The World Bank*
Cross-Country Studies
The World Bank's Africa-region Nexus Project is a comprehensive review and statistical analysis of more than 41 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (Cleaver and Schreiber, 1995). This project examines the relationships between rapid population growth, environmental degradation, and poor agricultural performance. The results follow:
The availability of cultivable land per person is significantly lower than the rate of population growth.
Agricultural intensification, through greater use of fertilizers, increases crop yields at rates higher than the growth of population and reduces deforestation rates by almost 3% per year.
A population growth rate exceeding 2.5% per year increases deforestation (or land degradation) by 1.5% per year.
National Studies
Time series and cross-section analyses of population and environment trends were conducted by the World Bank in Cote D'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Malawi, Nigeria, and a subset of the Sahelian countries. Other country studies were made in Costa Rica, the Philippines, Belize, Mexico, and Thailand.
Africa
The Africa studies reached three conclusions:
Agricultural intensification outside of forests and protected areas is vital to a country's economic growth.
Only a few protected areas can be expected to generate sufficient revenues from tourism and other sources to provide significant local income.
The significant factors affecting human uses of biodiversity resources are tenure, government's capacity to manage resources, and distribution of political power between the central and local governments.
Costa Rica and the Philippines
The studies of Costa Rica and the Philippines illustrate some of the long-run consequences of a history of high population-growth rates (Cruz et al., 1992). Population densities are high not only in urban centers but also in the frontier. Economic growth, although moderately rapid, has failed to provide enough new jobs to absorb excess rural labor. Family planning, health, and other social services have not reached the poor and rural households. The studies also demonstrate how economic policies have failed to reduce poverty. Ill-defined property reforms, which merely provided short-term leases to occupants of forests and coastal areas, induce movements to the frontier and encourage short-sighted cultivation and harvesting practices.
Belize, Mexico, and Thailand
The impacts of roads on deforestation in Belize, Mexico, and Thailand are analyzed through time-series land use changes from GIS maps (Chomitz and Gray, 1994). The evidence shows that where roads are built for the marketing of farm products, deforestation, and land clearing increased twofold in the following year. Accessibility or proximity of roads to major urban centers in Mexico not only significantly increased land clearing for agriculture but also led to larger rates of fuelwood cutting by women.
Case Studies
A case study of the Machakos District, Kenya, demonstrates how correct policies and strategic investments can break the cycle of population growth and environmental degradation (English et al., 1994). Since 1920, soil erosion rates have been increasing in Machakos, along with a fivefold increase in population. Throughout this process, land degradation has not been severe because of a mixture of good policies and interventions. The government of Kenya endorsed agricultural pricing that made farming profitable in the district. Roads and other infrastructure facilitated procurement of inputs and marketing. Land rights were secured through individualized titling, which encouraged farmers to invest in land. In addition, widespread support for health, education, and family planning existed. Local farmers' groups were trained in conservation farming, tree planting, and low-cost crop husbandry. However, the costs were high; questions were raised about how and if this approach could be replicated in other countries.
Another study that examined some of the nexus factors at the village level was the review of biodiversity conservation projects during the Bank/GEF's pilot phase (World Bank, 1994). Almost all protected areas in the 14 countries that received financing from the Bank and GEF were shown to be located in areas containing significant resident populations. Of these 14 countries, ten had population densities in their protected areas exceeding 100 persons per sq. km, a figure higher than most rural agricultural areas in Asia. Seven protected areas have large numbers of indigenous peoples residing inside the core or sanctuary.
Important social issues were also identified in the review:
social diversity, in particular, differences in population numbers, gender roles, and indigenous peoples' concerns;
tenure and access rights;
local customs governing livelihood;
conflict resolution;
institutional arrangements in project management;
financial arrangements, and;
stakeholder identification and participation.
Studies on Women and the Environment
The contributions of women in rural production systems are generally evaluated in terms of:
bearing and rearing children, thus influencing the quality of the future rural labor force;
managing households and acting as the primary users of natural resources such as fuelwood and water, and;
cultivating substantially large shares of village food crops, including applications of soil conservation, water retention, and waste and by-product recycling.
However, many legal, institutional, socio-economic, and cultural factors have constrained women's productivity. Examples include gender-biased land titling and inheritance policies as well as lack of access to credit and extension, project development, and research orientation. The role of women in rural production and conservation is critical, especially as men increasingly turn to nonfarm employment. In many protected sites in Sub-Saharan Africa, more than one-half of resource users and farms are managed by women. The number of female heads of households, as shown in the case studies in Zambia, is growing. In the Lusaka Province of Zambia, for example, female-headed household farms are, on the average, larger than male-headed farms. But women lack access to oxen, farm implements, and cash-earning opportunities, leading to what is widely known as the feminization of poverty (Cleaver and Schreiber, 1995).
Gender division of labor and land allocation were explicit in many rural systems. Three-fifths of respondents in a survey in Botswana noted how men and women engaged in specific tasks. In another survey in the forest-protected zones in the Uluguru Mountains of Tanzania, efforts to address water and fuelwood problems in order to preserve biodiversity in the area were directed specifically at women. Farming research kits in Kilosa, Tanzania, were designed to address women's needs since more than one-half of agricultural labor for planting, weeding and harvesting, and thinning were women.
Women's labor accounts for more than 90% of work in fuelwood gathering and carrying water for domestic uses in Africa. The time allotted by women to fuelwood collection also increases with the amount of degradation in an area. For example, the average travel distance required for this activity was two times longer than it had been during last five years, with an average of about 5 to 10 kms (see Table 3).
New patterns of agricultural development reinforced women's dominance in rural food crop production. For example, the shift to cocoa production in southern Ghana left women in charge of the planting, weeding, harvesting, transporting, and processing of food crops such as yams and cassava. In addition, women diversified planting strategies by creating home gardens planted with plantains, maize, cocoyam, cassava, and vegetables.
Insecurity of tenure is a serious problem for most women in protected sites. For example, most rural women traditionally have rights to use only those lands belonging to a male relative (e.g., Kenya, Tanzania, Madagascar, Malawi). Even in Sierra
TABLE 3. Time Allocation and Distance Traveled for Fuelwood Collection by Women.By Region
Country
Region
Year of Study
Average Time Alloted for Fuelwood Consumption
Average Distance Traveled for Fuelwood Collection
Asia
Nepal
India
Bangladesh
Indonesia
Pangua (hills)
Garhwal (hills)
Bihar (depleted forest)
Chargopal
Java
1970s
1980s
1980
1977
1973
4-5 hours/bundle
5 hours/day
No data
0.4 hours/day
0.3 hours/day
No data
1-2 kms/day
8-10 kms/day
No data
No data
Africa
Sahel
Kenya
Ghana
Not specified
Not specified
Not specified
1977
1970s
1980s
3 hours/day
3.0-3.5 hours/day
4-5 trips/week
10 kms
No data
2.5-7 miles
Latin America
Peru
Pincos (highlands)
Matapuan (highlands)
1981
1981
1.33 hours/day
1.67 hours/day
No Data
No DataNOTE: The figures in this table are based on different women's time allocation studies compiled in Agarwal (1986, 1989).
Leone and Ghana, where land belongs to the community and use-rights are held by lineage, women tend to use their husband's or male kin's lands because women have poor access to tractors and wage labor. Thus, to ease peak labor constraints, women sometimes give up their tenure rights to land and resources. This action permits them to join labor exchanges and cooperative arrangements or to continuously rely upon their own labor and that of their children, which, in turn, contributes to the maintenance of high fertility rates.
Female labor and lack of time have been a major constraint in maintaining sustainable farming practices. For example, the growing outmigration of males has left many fields cultivated by women unattended. The women and children lack sufficient adult labor to maintain the dikes and canals. Due to labor shortages, even chitemene farming in Zambia, which makes use of lopped tree branches for burning to improve the soil's fertility, is being replaced by the practice of felling entire trees.
These findings show that policy reforms focused on alleviating women's resource, capital, and labor constraints were more likely to improve food production than policies that attracted men into farming. The Zimbabwe case study demonstrates that by improving women's access to credit and extension services, small farm output increased from 6% of the national total in 1982 to more than 40% by the mid-1980s. The Zimbabwe government's policy to eliminate the requirement that a husband must sign his wife's credit statement has substantially increased women's farm credit. Designing Nexus Programs
Given the range of results from these Work Bank and GEF studies, a single strategic policy intervention that would retard the process of population growth, impoverishment, and loss of biodiversity is difficult to identify. In many countries, multiple points of intervention exist. For example, the absence of land tenure affects population policies when uncontrolled land occupation induces in-migration to frontier sites (e.g., Costa Rica, the Philippines, Thailand). Economic policies that depress real wages and employment also have significant demographic consequences because poor households tend to have higher fertility rates. Similarly, the failure to address rapid population growth is seen as both a resource and environmental problem that has long-term environmental impacts. PEOPLE AND BIODIVERSITY: MANAGEMENT OPTIONS
The summaries of regional, national, and community case studies on population and environment indicate that knowledge about this subject has been increasing. The research results have focused on a range of subjects and contexts because several complex factors and processes define the interactions between people and biodiversity. However, the issues must be prioritized in order to focus on the key problems where policy reforms and management interventions are critical.
The following management options are organized around what are perceived to be the priority issues, based upon the summaries of the studies, as well as comments from developing country executing agencies. These options examine actions that may lead to meaningful interventions at the project or field level. Perhaps they will eventually lead to changes in international development assistance. Defining the Allowable Human Uses of Biodiversity Resources
A more rigorous and scientific assessment of biodiversity is clearly needed. The case studies indicate that comparisons across countries, and within regions in a country, are difficult without a common definition of biodiversity. Such a definition would cover the three areas of genetic diversity, species diversity, and habitat or ecosystem diversity. Once an understanding of what constitutes biodiversity is achieved, priority-setting criteria may be developed.
One criteria is an estimate of the sustainable offtake per capita in a given ecosystem or habitat if the area is to maintain its biodiversity. This analysis could contain classifications by biome and measures for inventory or recording of key species. The important question is how to measure the balance between human uses and a minimum level of sustainable biodiversity. Such criteria will then be used to justify different types of management interventions, including relocation of resident populations and rezoning of areas for protection (some of which may cover ancestral lands or cultural heritage sites). Determining the Appropriate Measures of Population Pressures
A combination of demographic measures has been proposed in operationalizing population pressure on biodiversity resources. The studies emphasize population density, but often the density figures do not reflect the true nature of the ecological stresses. Because per-person impacts on biodiversity vary greatly by site (differences in ecological and geomorphological characteristics), one cannot assume that density refers to a homogenous land variable across sites. Refining the use of the word density to reflect microenvironmental differences will be important.
Some promising approaches have been tried. For example, in the Ghana Coastal Wetlands Project funded by the Bank and GEF, density measurements are combined with demographic attributes by sub-population. These attributes include the means of livelihood, settlement location, gender, and migration status. Using GIS data over a period of ten years has facilitated the analysis of historical population pressures and how these pressures shifted land uses over time. Designing Relevant Programs to Address Local Needs
Research on local needs vis-a-vis biodiversity conservation requirements is limited. Little systematic evaluation of community management approaches exists beyond descriptive reports on, for example, the Zimbabwe Project "Campfire" and Haitian programs. Even the ICDP project reviews contained very little information on the impacts of these projects on incomes and lifestyles.
A more systematic review of the results achieved by biodiversity projects could include the following:
assessments of whether households were better or worse off after the project;
quantification of changes in ecosystem biodiversity versus changes in human behavior (e.g., shifts in livelihood and controls), and;
ethnographic observations of local management or control mechanisms (e.g., coping strategies that evolved and conflict management mechanisms).
Researchers need to examine innovative approaches and biodiversity projects that have been tried both in and outside of protected areas. Some of these approaches follow:
Develop new forms of financing that include trust funds or other mechanisms that ensure longer term financing.
Make bureaucratic changes in government environmental agencies (e.g., creation of a parastatal management unit in Kenya or using NGOs as executing agencies for protected area management in the Philippines).
Use participatory management. ("Campfire" combines government extension workers with village headmen. In Ghana, Ecuador, and the Philippines, biodiversity projects hire community officers to assist in village conservation site planning and implementation. Livelihood funds or trusts have been created and supported by the MacArthur Foundation in some areas.)
Use negotiated solutions to resolve conflicts. (Some communities have developed ways to control migrant encroachments. For example, in Ecuador's Podocarpus National Park, the NGO - Fundacion Maquipucuna - facilitated the demarcation of physical boundaries and the assignment of responsibilities for maintaining trees and other resources. The NGO signed a contract with the government to manage the sites and to resolve disputes over who has the rights to use the area's resources.)
Creating a Conducive Environment for Implementing Participatory Programs
The policy environment should be conducive for addressing population and biodiversity issues. Policies could include those that:
reduce the incentives for rural-to-rural migration or frontier movements;
promote more equitable access to resources and remove the urban or industrial bias in pricing and taxation;
encourage rational land use planning, especially in growing urban centers, and;
facilitate the devolution of management authority to local users for the purposes of building ownership; increasing accountability; and empowering affected groups to govern, thus encouraging them to engage in capacity building and to participate in project decision making.
REFERENCES
Chomitz, Kenneth, and David Gray. 1994. Roads, Land, Markets and Deforestation: A Spatial Model of Land Use in Belize. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
Cleaver, Kevin M., and Gotz A. Schreiber. 1995. Reversing the Spiral: The Population, Agriculture and Environmental Nexus in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
Cruz, Maria Concepcion J., Carrie Meyer, Robert Repetto, and Richard Woodward. 1992. Population, Poverty, and Environmental Stress: Frontier Migration in the Philippines and Costa Rica. Washington, DC: World Resources Institute.
English, John, Mary Tiffen, and Michael Mortimore. 1994. Land Resource Management in Machakos District, Kenya 1930Ð1990. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
World Bank Environment Department. 1994. Social and Participation Issues in Biodiversity Conservation: A Review of GEF/Bank Financed Phase Projects. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
*Author's Note: This text was prepared for the AAAS meeting on "Human Population, Biodiversity, and Protected Areas: Science and Policy Issues." The views expressed herein are solely those of the author, who is a social scientist, formerly with the Environment Department, Social Policy and Resettlement Division, the World Bank. These views should not be attributed to the World Bank, to its affiliated organizations, its Board of Executive Directors, or the countries they represent.
