Relationship between environment and poverty

Relationship between environment and poverty

1.0 Introduction

The majority of the 2.6 billion people surviving on less than $2 per day live in rural areas. In Cameroon, rural communities account for 45 percent of the total population and 87 percent of the people living in poverty. The half of the population living in rural areas is isolated and particularly vulnerable to poverty and health issues, (Germen Foundation website, 2009). Without viable alternatives, the rural poor often pursue short-term moneymaking and survival strategies, such as slash-and-burn agriculture and illegal logging. These practices trigger a downward spiral of environmental destruction and desperate poverty. Socio-economic research by the Environment and Rural Development Foundation (ERuDeF, 2006/2007) across the Western Cameroon forest area shows that most of the areas considered as biodiversity hot spots are located in communities suffering from extreme poverty, that most often live on less than a dollar per day. With the absence of other survival means, these poor people are forced into economic activities on the land that often results to rapid environmental degradation and loss of endangered species. With the above findings, this paper is trying to look at a relationship between poverty and environmental conservation in the Western Cameroon forest highland and the possibilities of mitigating environmental degradation by addressing poverty in the region through alternative livelihoods programs.
1.1 What is Environmental Degradation?
Environmental destruction according to the World Centre is define as the process whereby, the planet's natural ecosystems and regenerating bio-capacity are being severely degraded and as a result, this compromises the ability of the planet to sustain life. Forests, fisheries, oceans, rangeland, fresh water systems (lakes, wetlands, rivers) and other natural ecosystems are all threatened while many are on the verge of collapse. Water, land and air are getting increasingly polluted, water tables are falling, soil erosion is leading to desertification, global warming is well underway, and species are dying out 1000 times faster than their natural rate of extinction.
1.2 Causes of Environmental Destruction in Cameroon
Socio-economic research by Environment and Rural Development Foundation in the Western Cameroon Forest Area 2004-2008 shows that, the main causes of forest/environment degradation and disappearance of species are: logging, unsustainable hunting, unsustainable fishing, industrial development, agricultural activities as well as government policies.
1.2.1 Logging
The richness of the Western Cameroon Forest attracts numerous commercial logging companies, which engaged in cutting down mature trees that have been selected for their timber. The timber trade defends itself by saying that this method of 'selective' logging ensures that the forest regenerates naturally and in time, and is once again ready for their 'safe' logging practices (WWF, 2008). In most cases, this is untrue due to the nature of rainforests and of logging practices. Large areas of rainforest are destroyed in order to remove only a few logs. The heavy machinery used to penetrate the forests and build roads causes extensive damage. Trees are felled and soil is compacted by heavy machinery, decreasing the forest's chance for regeneration. The felling of one 'selected' tree, tears down with it climbers, vines, epiphytes and lianas. A large hole is left in the canopy and complete regeneration takes hundreds of years.
Removing a felled tree from the forest causes even further destruction, especially when it is carried out carelessly, like the case in the Western Cameroon Forest Area. This is particularly cause with the hilly and rocky nature of the landscape where logging take place. Destruction is not only destroying only trees, endangered species of animals found in the forest along side are destroyed as their habitats are destroyed. The tracks made by heavy machinery and the clearings left behind by loggers are sites of extreme soil disturbance which begin to erode in heavy rain. This causes siltation of the forests, rivers and streams. The lives and life support systems of indigenous people of Western Cameroon are disrupted as is the habitat of hundreds of birds and animals. Little if any industrial logging of tropical forests is sustainable. The International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO), the body established to regulate the international trade in tropical timber, found in 1988 that the amount of sustainable logging was "on a world scale, negligible". "Logging roads are used by landless farmers to gain access to rainforest areas. For this reason, commercial logging is considered by many to be the biggest single agent of tropical deforestation"
Apart from its direct impact, logging plays a major role in deforestation through the building of roads which are subsequently used by landless farmers to gain access to rainforest areas. These displaced people then clear the forest by slashing and burning to grow enough food to keep them and their families alive, a practice which is called subsistence farming. This problem is so widespread that Robert Repetto of the World Resources Institute ranks commercial logging as the biggest agent of tropical deforestation. Most of the rainforest timber on the international market is exported to rich countries. There, it is sold for hundreds of times the price that is paid to the indigenous people whose forests have been plundered. The timber is used in the construction of doors, window frames, crates, coffins, furniture, plywood sheets, chopsticks, household utensils and other items. Logging doesn’t only ends in destroying tropical forest, it also goes a long way to expose endangered species to hunters resulting to extinction of most species. Research by ERuDeF, 2008 shows that, the main causes for the disappearance of the Critically Endangered Cross River gorilla in the Western Cameroon Forest Area is the creation of the logging concession separating the Mbayand-Mbo forest block from the Lebialem-Mone forest block.
1.2.2 Agriculture - Shifted Cultivators
'Shifted cultivators' is the term used for people who have moved into rainforest areas and established small-scale farming operations. These are the landless peasants who have followed roads into already damaged rainforest areas. The additional damage they are causing is extensive. Shifted cultivators are currently being blamed for 60% of tropical forest loss (Colchester & Lohmann). This is a very common practice in the Bechati-Fossimondi-Besali Forest block in the Western Cameroon Forest Area. The reason these people are referred to as 'shifted' cultivators is that most of the people have over exhausted the piece of lands they use for agriculture due to rudimentary techniques of agriculture. This opportunity is usually created by logging companies by creating them roads. They became 'shifted cultivators', moving into rainforest areas of which they had no previous knowledge in order to sustain themselves and their families (Colchester & Lohmann). After a time, these farmers encounter the same problems as it happens to their previous farms. The soil does not remain fertile for long. They are forced to move on, to shift again, going further into the rainforest and destroying more and more of it. It is evident that the shifted cultivators "have become the agents for destruction but not the cause (Westoby 1987: Colchester). Shifted cultivators do not move into pristine areas of undisturbed rainforests. They follow roads made principally for logging operations. "Shifted cultivators are often used by the timber industry as scapegoats". Yet logging roads lead to an estimated 90% of the destruction caused by the slash-and-burn farmers (M.Colchester, 1991). Most of the farms found in the Lebialm-Mone forest block by ERuDeF in it 2008 research where along the roads constructed by logging companies.
1.2.3 Firewood
The United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that '1.5 billion of the 2 billion people worldwide who rely on firewood for cooking and heating are overcutting forests. This problem is worst in drier regions of the tropics, for example Cameroon. Solutions will probably involve a return to local peoples' control of the forests they depend on. Research by ERuDeF shows that, 99% of the population of Western Cameroon forest region uses firewood as a means for heating and cooking and 1% of these population uses a mixture with some other cooking and heating methods.
1.2.4 Tourism
The creation of national parks by the government of Cameroon has undoubtedly helped to protect rainforests. Yet, as national parks are open to the public, tourism is damaging some of these areas. Often, national parks in the Western Highland Forest Area of Cameroon are advertised to tourists before adequate management plans have been developed and implemented. Inadequate funding is allocated for preservation of forests by government departments. Governments see tourism as an easy way to make money, and therefore tourism is encouraged whilst strict management strategies are given far less government support. Ecotourism, or environmentally friendly tourism, should educate the tourists to be environmentally aware. It should also be of low impact to its environment. Unfortunately, many companies and resorts who advertise themselves as eco-tourist establishments are in fact exploiting the environment for profit. In Mount Cameroon area in Cameroon for example, the rainforest is being threatened by excessive tourism. Clearing for roads and pollution of waterways are two of the major problems in this area. The Wet Tropics Management Authority which oversees the surrounding World Heritage Area is promoting tourism to the area before any management plans have been formulated, before any effective waste management strategy has been devised and before any eco-friendly power alternatives have been fully explored. This is very common in the Western Cameroon Forest Area, with the creation of Mt Cameroon National Park and the Mbomboko Forest Reserve, which already attracts a significant number of tourists, yet these parks do not have any services to ensure environmental friendly tourism like waste management systems.
1.2.5 Excessive use of renewable resources
Low-income urban dwellers in the Western Cameroon Highlands Forest adjacent communities have much lower levels of consumption than middle and upper income groups next to these communities. They use much less freshwater, although this is more due to inconvenient and/or expensive supplies than need or choice. They occupy much less land per person than middle and upper income groups – in extreme cases, the poorest 30-50 percent of a city’s population live on only 3-5 percent of the city’s land area. Low income groups consume less food and generally have diets that are less energy and land intensive than higher income groups. There are cases of low income populations depleting renewable resources in the area- for instance where low income settlements have developed around reservoirs into which they dump wastes or where low income settlements have developed on slopes which, when cleared for housing, contribute to serious soil erosion (and the clogging of drains) but these are problems caused more by the failure of urban authorities to ensure lower income groups to find safer residential sites. In many low income communities of the Western Cameroon Forest Area, many urban dwellers use fuel wood or charcoal for cooking (and where needed heating) and this may contribute to deforestation - although these fears have often proved to be without foundation.

1.2.6 Waste generation
Low-income groups in the forest adjacent communities of Western Cameroon Forest Area generate much less waste per person than middle and upper income groups. The urban poor generally have an ecologically positive role as they are the main declaimers, re-users and recyclers of wastes from industries, workshops and wealthier households. It is likely to be middle and upper income groups who consume most of the goods whose fabrication generates most toxic or otherwise hazardous wastes or persistent chemicals whose rising concentration within the environment has worrying ecological and health implications. There are small-scale urban enterprises (including illegal or informal enterprises) which cause serious local environmental problems for instance contaminating local water sources, but their contribution to city-wide pollution problems relative to other groups is usually small. In addition, one cannot ascribe the pollution caused by small scale enterprises to the urban poor when many such enterprises are owned by middle or upper income groups. Excessive pollution in rivers in the Western Cameroon Forest Area are cause by the CAMEROON Development Cooperation, They have render many small springs and water sources undrinkable.

1.2.7 Uncontrollable use of non-renewable resource
Most of the houses in which low income groups live (and often build for themselves) use recycled or reclaimed materials and little use of cement and other materials with a high energy input. Low income households have too few capital goods to represent much of a draw on the world’s finite reserves of metals and other non-renewable resources. Most low income groups in urban areas rely on public transport (or they walk or bicycle) which means low average figures for oil consumption per person. On average, they have low levels of electricity consumption on average, not only because those who are connected use less but also because a high proportion of low income households have no electricity supply. So they are responsible for very little of the fossil fuel use that arises from oil, coal or gas fuelled power stations (and most electricity is derived from such power stations).

2.0 Relationship between poverty and the environment
Many international reports claim that poverty is a major cause of environmental degradation, including the World Commission on Environment and Development’s report, Our Common Future and UNEP’s Geo 2000. There is very little evidence that this is actually the case on a global scale either in rural areas or in urban areas. In urban areas, it is overwhelmingly the consumption patterns of non-poor groups (especially high income groups) and the production and distribution systems that serve them that are responsible for most environmental degradation. The urban poor contribute very little to environmental degradation because they use so few resources and generate so few wastes. There is a strong association between environmental health problems and urban poverty and the confusion between environmental health risk and environmental degradation’ may explain why urban poverty is thought to contribute to environmental degradation. But the two should not be confused. Most environmental health risks pose no threats to environmental degradation. Environmental degradation is usually understood in terms of high use of scarce nonrenewable resources, damage or destruction of key renewable resources (such as soils, forest etc) and the generation of wastes that are not easily assimilated or broken down by natural processes. So let’s consider the role of urban poverty in each of these.

3.0 Conclusion
An analysis of the various causes of environmental destruction in the Forest Western Cameroon Forest Region as outline above are: Uncontrollable use of non-renewable resource, Greenhouse gas emissions, Waste generation, Tourism, Agriculture - Shifted Cultivators etc, we can draw conclusions that, there is a very limited relationship between poverty and environmental destruction and very limited findings of causality where realized during my research findings. Biodiversity loss and poverty in the Western Cameroon Forest Area of Cameroon are two linked problems rather than simple causal relationships. The quality of governance appears to be critical to both. Interventions in both arenas have the potential to be mutually reinforcing. Poverty may contribute to biodiversity loss, but it is only one of a number of factors. Whether poor people conserve or over-exploit biodiversity is dependent on specific circumstances and contexts and particularly on the influence of external governance factors and not a question to which a generalized answer can be given.




























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