Relevance for Development and Poverty Reduction
Intact Ecosystems are Indispensable
Conservation of ecosystems - only with the people. Source: KfW Picture Archive / Florian Kopp
Many countries in which tropical forests are located belong to the poorest of the world. Well over 100 million people, especially indigenes people and peasants, live in tropical forests. Another 800 million poor inhabitants of rural areas are located at the boundaries of tropical forests or in savannahs and directly depend on the forest which is providing them with fire wood, food, medicine, and goods for selling.
Intact ecosystems are indispensable for the preservation of a good quality of soil, the provision of healthy potable water and the prevention of erosion. These so called environmental services form an enormous economic value which more and more is being calculated, e.g. in the study “The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity” (TEEB).
Many conventional approaches of nature conservation, practiced until the 1980ies, regarded the local population as menace or disturbing factor. However, at least since the World Summit for the Environment and Development in Rio in 1992, the development aspect of nature conservation is well recognized: in the long run, natural ecosystems cannot be preserved against but only with the local population.
In general the conservation and sustainable utilization of natural ecosystems is closely intertwined with poverty reduction.
Last updated: July 2011
