Transcript Environmental Issues and the Aid regime

Environmental Issues in the Aid
Regime: What are the
sustainable options for the
poor?
Issues and Challenges: Specific Impacts on Women
Friederike Knabe
3 October 2006
Outline of the Presentation
 Environmental Challenges in Africa
– Land degradation and poverty
• The case of drylands
– Strategies for Change
• Traditional coping strategies
• New approaches to environmental challenges
– Focus on Women
• Addressing women’s needs and aspirations
 The Canadian International Policy Commitments
• Commitment to UN Conventions (CBD, UNCCD, UNFCCC)
• Millennium Development Goals
• International Strategy Paper
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Introduction: Kenya project
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Mount Kenya Youth Initiative for
Ecosystem Restoration
 Focus on Schools
– Nurseries with indigenous
tree seedlings
– Protected woodlots with
indigenous hardwood trees
 Education for students
– Surplus seedlings for
students
– Education of parents
– HIV/AIDS education
 Resources for communities
– Agroforestry Resource
Centre in schools
– Demonstration plots
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Environmental Challenges
 Land degradation
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– Land slides, soil erosion and destruction of vegetative
cover
Deforestation
– Cutting of precious local varieties of hardwood trees
Loss of local biodiversity
– Trend towards monoculture farming; externally supplied
seeds; loss of knowledge of integrated farming systems;
Water scarcity
– Destruction of wetlands and drying out of the river
Climatic variability
– Drought last year and heavy flooding this year
Out migration of local population
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Land Degradation and Poverty
 Over 70% of all arable land in Africa is
• Degraded or rapidly degrading with nutrient-poor soil
• Overexploited due to lack of choices by rural poor and
demographic pressure
• Exposed to droughts, floods and climatic variabilities
 Over 45% of Africa’s land is defined as
“drylands”
• Arid, semi-arid or dry-subhumid regions
• Vulnerable to land degradation, leading to desertification
• Local populations most marginalized with highest poverty
rates and minimum of essential services
• Highly dependent on environment for livelihood security
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Development Pathways in
Drylands
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Traditional prevention and
coping strategies
 Integrated land and water management
– Protection of vegetative cover;
– Mixed farming practices between cropping and pastoral
land use and a tighter economic and cultural integration;
– Conservation and use of local drought tolerant crop
varieties;
– Use of locally suitable technologies to work with
ecosystem processes rather than against them;
 Development of alternative livelihoods that
– Are less demanding on local land and natural resource
use;
– Provide sustainable incomes;
– Develop economic opportunities in dryland urban
centres.
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New Approaches to
Environmental Challenges
 Sustainable Land Management
• Integrating land, water and other natural resource
management
– Example: TerrAfrica Initiative
 Ecosystem Approach
• Defining and assessing ecosystem goods and services
• Bringing together of environmental sustainability with
livelihood security
• Revision of National Development Plans and PRSPs
 Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation
• Assessing and documenting vulnerabilities
• Capacity development for applying climate forecasting
data;
• Developing new adaptation strategies building on local
knowledge.
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Focus on Women
 Most vulnerable sector
– Women’s major role in food production;
– Responsible for household chores, water supply and
fuel;
– Dependent on environmental resources;
– Disadvantaged by limited access to services;
– Limited land ownership and use rights;
 Women and environmental challenges
– Intimately impacted by environmental conditions
– Intimately involved in environmental stewardship
– Limited role in environmental decision making
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Addressing Women’s needs and
aspirations
 Thirty Years of Commitments and Little Action
– UN Decade for Women (1975-85)
– Beijing Platform for Action (1995)
• Recognition of complexity and multidimensionality of
women’s poverty
• Women and Environment:
– Involve women actively in environmental decision making at all
levels;
– Integrate gender concerns and perspectives in policies and
programs for sustainable development;
– Strengthen or establish mechanisms at all levels to assess
impact of development and environmental policies on women.
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Beijing Conference 2006: Main
Areas for Action
– Management of Natural Resources (particularly water
and land)
• Integrated management of water and land resources
• Decentralization of forest, land and water resource
management to local communities and ensure women’s
participation in policy-making processes;
• Financial benefit for communities’ stewardship of forests
and other natural resources
• Technologies for water conservation and management to
respond to women’s needs., e.g. water harvesting, reuse
and recycle, soil conservation;
• Integrated gender-oriented ecosystem approach;
• Land rights and ownership for women.
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Main Areas for Action cont.
– Food Security
• Build on traditional knowledge and appropriate
technologies for food production and conservation;
• Promotion and research into the value, use and processing
of local plant varieties;
• Promotion of the full utilization of all agricultural products
and plant components as well as conservation of local crop
varieties and sharing of experiences among communities;
• Development of urban agriculture to increase food supply
and improve nutrition;
• Facilitation of women’s access to markets, agricultural
technologies, transport and micro-finance;
• Promoting the concept of livelihood security incorporating
food security.
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Main Areas for Action cont.
– Education and skill development
• Women’s participation in decision making
• Promoting local knowledge
• Facilitating capacity building
– Energy
• Renewable energy resources and related technologies
• Sustainable biomass use and production
– Health
• Promotion of traditional knowledge of multipurpose trees
and crops
• Research into improving nutrition levels
• Water availability and quality
• Recognition of HIV/AIDS impact on communities
• Reproductive health facilities
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Canadian International Policy
Commitments
 Millennium Development Goals
– Goal 3 (women’s empowerment),
– Goal 7 (environmental sustainability)
 Multilateral Environment Agreements (MEAs)
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UNCBD, UNCCD, UNFCCC
Common vision for sustainable development
Synergies at the national and regional levels
Civil society participation
 International Policy Statement (IPS)
• Advancing Environmental Sustainability
• Addressing Land Degradation
• Reducing Impact of Climate Change
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African initiatives and models
 National NGO networks
– linking development and environment issues
– Acting as National Focal Points for MEAs
 Regional Networks
– Example: (RNSCC) West and Central African
environmental and poverty-oriented NGOs aims to
organize:
• (a) the exchange of knowledge on the CCD/CBD synergy
between the network partners,
• (b) the interaction of network partners with international
CCD/CBD synergy experts, and
• (c) the creation of joint experiences of network partners
with CCD/CBD synergy;
• and to strengthen the capacities of its member NGOs;
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Canadian Civil Society
 What is the role of environmental issues in
the Aid Regime ???
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