Justice in development? An analysis of water interventions in the rural South

This paper explores a fruitful convergence between the distributive and procedural dimensions of environmental justice theory and current debates in the field of development studies over capitals and capabilities, institutions, and discourse formation to shed new light on natural resource management projects in the developing world. Specifically, we document the planning and implementation of two types of water interventions in two contrasting regions: watershed development programmes in northeast India and small reservoirs in sub‐Saharan West Africa. We find that there is a contradiction between the inherently political nature of water interventions and the fact that such projects remain grounded in apolitical, technical and managerial narratives. In contrast to the new semantic of development, this depoliticization results in the near absence of attention paid to procedural (participation and empowerment) and distributive (equity) justice concerns and in local actors having to revert to covert ways to achieve their ends. A constructive dialogue between development studies and environmental justice scholars can offer a fresh look on the society‐environment nexus in the developing world.     

Downstream and Coastal Impacts of Damming and Water Abstraction in Africa

Anthropogenic factors associated with damming and water abstraction, and the resultant environmental pressures, are reviewed in six African river catchments using records and forecasts of climatic, demographic, and land-use change. Changes in the states of the flow regime through catchment drainage systems to the coastal sea are considered in conjunction with climate change and other human-induced pressures. The impacts of these changes on downstream and coastal environments and their communities are described in past, present, and future perspectives. Linkages between the issues and the pressures of damming and water abstraction are appraised and scientific, policy, and management responses proposed aimed at remedying existing and perceived future negative impacts. The study proposes that there is a need to integrate catchment and coastal management to account for the whole water flow regime together with its human dimensions. Management priorities relating to the operation of existing damming and abstraction schemes and planning of future schemes include the following: consideration of ways in which water discharges could be adjusted to provide improvements in downstream and coastal environmental and socioeconomic conditions; addressing the problem of sediment trapping impacting on the sustainability of dam reservoirs; and assessment of downstream and coastal impacts of future schemes in the light of climate change forecasts.     

Sustainability assessment of national rural water supply program in Tanzania

Sustainability of rural water supply programs in developing countries is still an elusive goal. It is widely accepted that, as a rule, they have failed to deliver benefits to society in the long run. Emphasis has frequently been placed on the short‐term activities. Fast production of new schemes is thus a common strategy, prioritizing the engineering component, while sidestepping social and participatory issues and community empowerment. In 2006, the Government of Tanzania launched a national program to meet water sector targets set out in the Millennium Development Goals by the year 2015. In this study we evaluate key features of the program on a sustained basis. There is evidence that the Government is promoting more sustained facilities, focusing on cost recovery and on ‘decentralization by devolution’. Nevertheless, there are several shortcomings which threaten the long‐term functionality of the infrastructure that has to be built. In light of the implementation of the program, and based on the outputs of its pilot phase, we review the factors that can determine its sustainability.     

The rains are disappointing us: dynamic vulnerability and adaptation to multiple stressors in the Afram Plains, Ghana

This paper builds on work on the dynamics of vulnerability and multiple stressors through a case study in the Afram Plains of the Eastern region in Ghana. A vulnerability framework is applied in the community of Mimkyemfre to identify and explain the multiple underlying political, socioeconomic and environmental forces that influence the ways in which people are exposed and sensitive to climate, and their capacities to adapt to changing conditions. The results of the study indicate that the community experiences a range of biophysical and socioeconomic conditions that contribute to its vulnerability. Vulnerability was found to change over time and in some cases was cyclical, in that certain actions taken for the purposes of adaptation were found to exacerbate existing vulnerabilities. Processes of vulnerability were also found to occur at several scales and were experienced unevenly at the community level. The findings of this assessment have important implications for the design and implementation of successful adaptation initiatives, both in Africa and elsewhere. In particular, they demonstrate the need to understand the social, economic and institutional challenges to development as a basis for any contemplation of adaptation to climate change.     

Effects of Harvest of Nontimber Forest Products and Ecological Differences between Sites on the Demography of African Mahogany

Abstract: The demographic impacts of harvesting nontimber forest products (NTFP) have been increasingly studied because of reports of potentially unsustainable harvest. Nevertheless, our understanding of how plant demographic response to harvest is altered by variation in ecological conditions, which is critical for developing realistic sustainable‐use plans, is limited. We built matrix population models to test whether and how variation in ecological conditions affects population responses to harvest. In particular, we examined the effect of bark and foliage harvest on the demography of populations of African mahogany (Khaya senegalensis) in two contrasting ecological regions of Benin, West Africa. K. senegalensis bark and foliage harvest significantly reduced its stochastic population growth rates, but ecological differences between regions had a greater effect on population growth rates than did harvest. The effect of harvest on population growth rates (Δλ) was slightly stronger in the moist than in the drier region. Life‐table response experiments revealed that the mechanism by which harvesting reduced λ differed between ecological regions. Lowered stasis (persistence) of larger life stages lead to a reduction in λ in the drier region, whereas lowered growth of all life stages lowered λ in moist region. Potential strategies to increase population growth rates should include decreasing the proportion of individuals harvested, promoting harvester‐owned plantations of African mahogany, and increasing survival and growth by promoting no‐fire zones in gallery forests. Our results show how population responses to harvest of NTFP may be altered by ecological differences across sites and emphasize the importance of monitoring populations over the climatic range in which they occur to develop more realistic recommendations for conservation.