Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
cooperation with the local community (Chambers
1995 ; G รณ mez - Pompa & Bainbridge 1995 ). Interrelat-
ing social and ecological factors provides the critical
insight needed to understand the problems and suggest
solutions. The challenges in determining what makes
a particular community sustainable need to be under-
stood, including questions of health, education, em-
ployment, innovation, community involvement, crime
and corruption, culture and opportunities for improve-
ment. Often the goals may be as simple as safe and
comfortable housing, adequate food, clean water and
economic opportunity. It is important to compare the
relations between these over time by ethnicity, caste
and income class as well. The Genuine Progress Indica-
tor or the
Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare
can help
us understand the sustainability of social systems (Cos-
tanza
et al
. 2004 ). Developing
ecological footprint
and sustainable area budgets for the area or region
may also be instructive (Rees 2006; Levine
et al
. 2010 ).
These can help establish budgets for energy, water, food
or other resources that would be sustainable over the
long term. If the community and culture are not sus-
tainable, successful environmental restoration will not
be possible.
Evaluating the
sustainability
of socio - economic
systems involves measures of both structure and func-
tion much like the ecosystem factors. The fl ow of
money is very important, but many social system inter-
actions do not involve cash fl ow, and labour contribu-
tions or gifts and exchanges have not been recorded,
studied or counted by conventional economics. Eco-
logical impacts are even less likely to be costed and
incorporated in accounting (Bainbridge 2006). All
countries also have shadow economies (illegal activi-
ties or economic enterprises with no records and no
taxes). These shadow fl ows may be very important,
particularly in marginal arid lands. Understanding
these economic factors can be critical in analysing the
resource management practices leading to desertifi ca-
tion or restoration.
Reducing or eliminating economic incentives that
promote poor management can lead to changes in
resource utilization that lead to restoration in use.
Destructive incentives can be corrected by the activities
of association, cooperation and lobbying, but those
who benefi t from current inequities and subsidies are
very reluctant to see policies and programmes change.
The problem is rarely at the farm or ranch level, but
further up the economic system with the banks, com-
panies and organizations involved in resource manage-
ment and fi nance. In the 1980s, for example, we found
that dryland farmers in Sonora, Mexico, were being
forced to abandon their sustainable locally adapted tra-
ditional corn varieties. To obtain credit, they had to
agree to use high-response corn and buy chemical fer-
tilizer. This increased risk and debt, with inevitable
failures driving people off the land, leading to land con-
solidation, further involvement in illegal activities and
emigration. Challenging and changing long-standing
subsidies and incentives are never easy. In developed
countries, protesting land managers may be snubbed,
ridiculed or shunned; but in developing countries, the
risks are much higher (Sinha 1991). Engaging stake-
holders in efforts to reshape socio-economic drivers to
be more sustainable is critical to improve management,
to facilitate restoration in use and to encourage the
conservation and restoration of important ecosystems
in reserves or protected areas.
10.4.2 Developing and
demonstrating solutions
More than half of the people living in drylands still
depend on farming, grazing, fuelwood harvesting,
hunting, poaching or wild gathering for a signifi cant
part of their living. All will have to add restoration to
their existing management activities if they intend
to move toward more sustainable
socio - ecological
systems
. Restoration activities can improve the quality
of life and the economic viability of small farm, forestry
or ranch enterprises (Tiedeman 2005). Restoration
may be undertaken on individually owned or control-
led land, or else on lands and resources held in common,
leased from or held by the government.
Land managers are most likely to adopt new prac-
tices if they have seen, visited and participated in a
working demonstration, yet demonstrations are rarely
included in restoration programmes. Degraded and
damaged lands are almost worthless and are not costly
to purchase or lease for restoration research and dem-
onstration. Cooperative on farm or ranch demonstra-
tions are very useful and can be encouraged by
protecting land owners with a funding guarantee of
no loss of income or yield while they experiment with
new crops or management practices. This strategy
proved useful for the Carter Foundation (set up by
former US President Jimmy Carter) in efforts to improve
agriculture in Africa. Small landholders are conser-
vative and often work to minimize risk rather than
