THIS BOOK CONSIDERS how political change can contribute to pro-poor environmental outcomes on the ground, and centres on ten case studies: seven rural or regional and three urban. Most of these case studies discuss how “pro-poor” policies and actions can be integrated into environmental management – for instance, the chapters on the Working for Water programme in South Africa, the Bioplan in Manizales, Colombia, coastal resource management in St Lucia, several projects in China, and reforms in the environmental management institutions of East Africa. Three chapters focus on integrating better environmental management into interventions aimed at reducing poverty, namely the chapter on the community-designed, built and managed toilets in Indian cities, one on village organizations in Northern Pakistan, and one on the municipal government-supported community initiatives in Ilo, Peru. Two chapters reflect on the extent to which donor and government initiatives failed to support poverty reduction or better environmental management, namely the cases of Usangu in Tanzania and the Hadejia Nguru wetlands in northern Nigeria.
One aspect illustrated by most of the case studies is the physical and institutional distance between international agencies and their intended “beneficiaries”, as the official development assistance agencies do not actually implement the projects they fund, but pay intermediaries to do so. There are also the complex political issues that influence the ways in which any international development agency’s assistance is allocated and used and which often limit it or prevent it from achieving its goals. The final chapter draws on the case studies to discuss the political underpinnings of poverty and environmental degradation – and its reverse, the political underpinnings of poverty reduction and sustainable natural resource management. This concluding chapter, along with all the case studies, suggests the need for international donors to seek new ways to work with disadvantaged groups, directly addressing their poverty and environmental needs in ways that are driven by their priorities and supported by their knowledge and capacities. It also looks at the need for donors to support local institutions that enable new forms of pro-poor environmental governance to form over time, thus encouraging the scaling up or multiplication of activities.
The book’s recommendations are hardly controversial, but they do raise difficult issues with regard to current international agency structures and aid instruments, which may not be best suited to the challenges ahead. The case studies warn of the extent to which decisions made by external agencies can get things wrong, because of pressures to spend allocated funds and complete projects too quickly, because of very limited local data and simplistic understandings of what underpins poverty and environmental degradation, and because of limited capacity to engage with local stakeholders. The book also notes that the shift by most donor agencies to direct budgetary support and to working more through poverty reduction strategy processes (or strategies to help achieve the commitments within the Millennium Development Goals) will not necessarily help to meet the challenges of locally rooted, locally accountable pro-poor environmental management.