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Poverty-Environment Nexus in search of an alternative scenario

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Title: Poverty-Environment Nexus in search of an alternative scenario


1
Poverty-Environment Nexus in search of an
alternative scenario
  • Atiur Rahman

2
  • Nature, mans first love, which brought to him
    the hospitality of gods became his arch-enemy.
    Man indiscriminately destroyed forest to build
    his brick-tenement. The sylvan goddess brought
    him blessing. Man ignored her and earned her
    curse. To save ourselves from utter disaster,
    we have to propitiate the sylvan goddess our
    patron, so she makes our land fertile and
    fruitful.
  • Rabindranath Tagore, Aronya Debota, Collected
    Works, Vol. 14, Page 372-3.

3
Context
  • Multi-dimensionality of poverty.
  • Poverty reduction major challenge for
    developing countries e.g. Bangladesh.
  • Economic growth versus sustainability.
  • Degraded environment means less resources for the
    poorest and future generations.

4
Conceptual Framework
  • Two interlinked causal processes
  • Poverty affecting environmental conservation.
  • Degraded environment affecting the poor.

Poverty regeneration
Poverty
Environment
Environmental degradation
5
The Linkages
  • Environment and Health
  • Pollutions having fatal consequences on the
    health of the poor.
  • Future generations badly affected.
  • Environment and Productivity
  • Two channels of depressing ability of the poor to
    generate income
  • Lowering productivity of labor
  • Reducing productivity of poors natural resources.

6
The Linkages
  • Poverty and Resource Management
  • Poor resource management (on the basis of
    day-to-day survival) due to poverty.
  • Degrading CPRs affecting access of the poor to
    natural insurance
  • Higher risks for the poorer.
  • Limited options for the poorer for managing the
    natural resources.

7
The Linkages
8
Facts Awareness
US Survey
  • The poor are less aware on environmental issues.

9
Facts Growth Zones
US Survey
  • Negative externalities of growth generating
    activities in growth zones
  • Industrial pollution poor suffering from various
    diseases.
  • Water logging and degraded water quality
    affecting the poor in particular.
  • Example Savar EPZ

10
Facts Growth Zones
US Survey
  • Pollution of Savar EPZ affecting the poor
  • Polluted water and air.
  • Reduced fertility of land.
  • Prevalence of mosquitoes and pests.
  • Reduced fish production.
  • 86 households consider these problems as severe.
  • Earnings of poor farmers reduced.

11
Facts Shrimp Cultivation
US Survey
  • Negative externalities
  • Increased salinity.
  • Reduced land productivity.
  • Reduced cultivable and pasture lands.
  • Scarcity of drinking water.
  • Poor farmers affected the most
  • Reduced production of crops.
  • Reduced income.

12
Facts Shrimp Cultivation
US Survey
  • 100 of the poor households do not want shrimp
    farming.

13
Facts Disaster
US Survey
  • Poor affected most by natural disaster e.g. river
    erosion
  • Assets destroyed.
  • Reduced earnings.
  • Increased indebtedness.
  • Poverty exacerbated
  • Poor become poorer.

14
Facts Disaster
  • Migration as a result of disaster.

(Rahman 2001)
15
Facts Disaster
US Survey
  • Seasonal poverty (monga) concentrated mostly in
    river erosion areas.
  • Negative impact of monga on environment
  • 80 of monga affected households involved in
    activities unfriendly to environment.
  • Cutting trees, over fishing.

16
Facts Gender Dimension
  • Women are subsistence producers and users of
    forests and CPRs.
  • Likely to be hit most by environmental
    degradation.
  • But the linkages between gender, poverty and
    sustainable development yet to be focused in
    Bangladesh.

17
Facts Int. Trade Dimension
  • Environmental requirements.
  • Standards poor institutional capacity.
  • Sanitary and phytosanitary measures.
  • Poor equipments, laboratories.
  • Market access.
  • Capacity low, particularly for SMEs.
  • Eco-labeling (Voluntary, yet important).

18
Facts Int. Trade Dimension
  • Poor capacity to assess economic and social costs
    of compliance of international standards.
  • RD missing.
  • Impact on cost and profitability.
  • Impact on employment of poor workers.

19
Lesson
  • The poor bear the brunt of most of the
    environmental problems caused by economic
    activities of the relatively better off people.
  • Example Climate Change

20
Climate Change
Source DFID 2004.
21
Impact on MDG
  • Sustainability of environment difficult to
    achieve.
  • Environmental damage hitting the poor the most.
  • Loss of biodiversity resulting in less access of
    poor to CPRs for livelihood.
  • Adverse impact on the poor making it difficult to
    achieve the goal of halving extreme poverty by
    2015.

22
Way Ahead
  • The poor to be a part of the solution, not a part
    of the problem.
  • Environmental sustainability not to be ignored
    while in pursuit of growth.
  • Environmental management to be integrated into
    efforts of poverty reduction.

23
Way Ahead
  • Environmental concerns of the poor to be
    incorporated in the national development
    framework.
  • Environmental management to be decentralized
    through
  • Sub-national policy and planning processes, and
  • Sectoral investment program.

24
Way Ahead
  • International trade support
  • RD Capacity Building to be supported for
    exports, particularly for SMEs.
  • Environment-friendly exports to be supported.
  • Renewable energy to be emphasized.
  • Solar power, bio-gas.
  • Pro-poor energy alternatives.

25
Way Ahead
  • The poor and marginalized to be empowered to
    influence environmental policy and planning
  • Increased public access to environmental
    information, decision making and justice.
  • Rights of the poor on CPRs to be strengthened.
  • Reforming policy and institutions that determine
    the access.

26
Way Ahead
  • Environmental governance
  • Mainstreaming environmental concerns in national
    policy framework.
  • Promoting community participation in planning.
  • Re-orientation of policy planning.
  • Oversight mechanisms.
  • Capacity building.
  • Women in decision-making
  • Social mobilization

27
Way Ahead
  • Environment acknowledged as one of the four
    supporting strategies for poverty reduction in
    PRSP
  • A good start
  • But environment yet to be mainstreamed.
  • Not supported sufficiently in the budget.
  • Requires strong political will.

28
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