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The paper has been prepared by N. Vijay Jagannathan, a Consultantto the Environment Department. The author is indebted to John English,Michael Mortimore, Jeremy Warford, R.A. Agunbiade, and David Pearce fortheir helpful comments. The author would also like to acknowledge thecontribution of R.A. Agunbiade of the Nigerian Institute for Social andEconomic Research, for having written one of the Nigerian case studiesdiscussed in the paper.

Departmental Working Papers are not formal publications of theWorld Bank. They present rough and tentative results of country and sectoranalysis or research, and are circulated to encourage discussion andcomment. Citation and use of such a paper should, therefore, take accountof its provisional character. The findings, interpretations andconclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the author andshould not be attributed in any manner to the World Bank, to its affiliatedorganizations, or to members of its Board of Executive Directors or thecountries they represent.

Because of the informal nature of this paper, and in order topresent the results of research with the least possible delay, thetypescript has not been prepared in accordance with the proceduresappropriate to formal printed texts, and the World Bank accepts noresponsibility for errors.

* ii .

In developing countries poverty and environmental deteriorationare often visible in proximity to each other, and have led many to inferthat a two-way causality exists between human and environmentaldegradation. The apparent association, however, draws away the attentionof policy makers from more substantive causal factors. This paper suggeststhat the real factors causing environmental degradation may lie elsewhere,such as: in specific acts of public policy, through the expansion ofconsumption demand for natural resources by growing populations, and by thespread of urbanization. The poor are merely one of several actors whorespond to changing incentive structures by altering their usage ofrenewable natural resources.

The links between poverty and renewable natural resourcedegradation, the pal r argues, require evaluating the role of economic andinstitutional policies in altering labor and capital flows between andwithin regions. As economic and spatial integration of markets occur,several new marginal income earning opportunities become available in theinformal sector of the economy, and the dependence of the poor on thenatural resource base for livelihoods may actually get reduced.

Three case studies from West Java (Indonesia), Ekiti-Akoko (S.Nigeria), and Gombe (N. Nigeria) are used to illustrate the linkagesbetween poverty, public policies and renewable natural resource use. Inall three, remote sensing imagery over two points of time provides basicdata on land areas where vegetative cover appear to have undergonesignificant changes. A diagnosis of the causal factors has then beenundertaken, and the paper demonstrates that the linkages between povertyand the environment have been largely influenced by economic andinstitutional policies. These policies have (a) shaped incentivestructures and (b) improved social and physical infrastructure, throughwhich natural resource usage has been affected. The poor, like the non-poor, have utilized opportunities brought about by the spatial integrationof economic activities, sometimes to the detriment, and at other times tothe benefit of long-term renewable natural resource usage.

POVERTY. PUBLIC POLICIES AND TE ENVIRONMENT

TABLZ OF CONTENTS

IaM

I. INTRODUCTION........... .

II. THE MATURE OF POVERTY-ENVIRONMENT LINKAGES ............ 4

A. Poverty vs. Public Policies ...................... 4B. A Conceptual Framework...........................5C. Role of Public Policies .......................... 7D . Methodology............................ .8

III. CASE STUDY OF RABUPATEN SUABUNI......... .11

A. Changes in Land Use in the Baskoning Study......11B. Rural Economic Changes. 1976-1986...............13C. Role of Public Policies.........................14D. Poverty and Environmental Degradation...........15

IV. TWO CASE STUDIES FROM NIGERIA........................18

A. Capabilities of the Physical System..............1B. Changes in Land Use Between 1970s and 1980s..... .20C. Implications for Poverty and Policy Analysis.....21

- Market Integration of Economic Activities......23- Role of ADP Policies...........................24- Role of Other Enabling Investments.............25- Inequalities in Access to Resources............26

V. CONCLUDING RENMS...................................28

- Validity of the Study for Research andOperational Use.................................29

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POVERTY. PUBLIC POLICIES AND THE ENVIROWENT:SOME nELUTVMM-Y FINDINGS

1.1. Environmental degradation usually occurs when production andconsumption activities of growing populations irreversibly weaken nature'srecycling capabilities. These economic activities are also attributed tothe development of markets, the advent of modern technology, and thespatial integration of inaccessible areas to market systems. In manydeveloping countries, however, environmental degradation such as soilerosion, deforestation and pollution are most visible around poorsettlements, leading some social scientists to highlight the direct linksbetween poverty and the environment.

1.2. One has to recognize that both poverty and the environment aredescriptions of states of human and natural resource attributes, and cannotbe reduced to simple unidimensional cause-effect relationships. Apart fromconceptual difficulties in modelling linkages, another handicap in manydeveloping countries, is the absence of adequate or reliable data sets onpoverty and environment characteristics. The challenge for operationalresearch is exploring how circumstantial evidence and inductive logic canbe used to explain the nature of interactions between the two states. Thisstudy is one such attempt, and evaluates the relative roles of poverty andpublic policies in changing the pattern of natural resource utilizationwith illustrations from Indonesia and Nigeria.

1.3. Perceptions of poverty-environment linkages in developingcountries are usually traced back to the common denominator of highpopulation growth tates, and rest on two premises:

(a) Selective improvements in social indicators (notably lifeexpectancy) have led to rapid increases in human populations ofdeveloping countries;

(b) Economic systems in these countries have failed to create adequateincome earning opportunities for the incremental workingpopulations.

1.4. One could then argue, ceteris paribus, that poor individuals, intheir search for food, would convert forests to farms, grow food on steepslopes and degrade marginal farmlands. Human history of several milleniaindicate that people have cut trees, hunted animals and burned forests intheir quest for food security. In poor economies the pressure ofpopulation would force agriculture on to more and more marginal lands,permanently impairing nature's regeneration capabilities, this argumentwould lead one to conclude. Finite natural resources would thus faceincreasing problems of negative externalities, and ecological systems wouldbe irreversibly degraded in their physical capabilities.

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1.5. The linkages between poverty and environmental degradation are,however, not just governed by the physical limits of ecosystems, butrather, by the income strategies of the poor deslite the observableproblems discussed in para 1.3. The reason is the penetration ofmonetization into remotest villages, with the spread of a "cash nexus"re-ordering economic and social values. Production and exchange throughimpersonal markets is strongly preferred to subsistence activities by poorproducers and consumers alike. Although family decisions and mutualresponsibilities may continue defining some aspects of household economicbehavior, market exchange irreversibly supplants reciprocity andredistribution as the means of acquiring income and wealth (Dalton 1981).Under these circumstances, except for a small group of the ultra poor, mostindividuals and groups could be expected to strive for income securityrather than just food security; cash being necessary to purchase non-traditional food and consumption items that reflect changing utilityfunctions. A desire for income security has led to creative income earningefforts through a myriad of highly divisible, labor intensive, low skillvocations involving wage labor and self-employment in rural and urbaninformal markets (Jagannathan 1987, Pean 1989).

1.6. The availability of these (often unrecorded) income earningopportunities reduces the necessity of the poor to mine land and waterresources close to their homes for survival. Equally important is whetherthe poor have the Rover to gain access or to use available naturalresources. Poverty is very often visible as unequal access to land andcapital because asset ownership in developing countries is inequitable.Moreover, monetization also appreciates land and water values to society,and what were common property rights begin to get privatized ornationalized. Under these circumstances, the poor are often unable toretain de facto access to productive land and water resources because ofsocial and institutional factors, such as changing tenurial relations, lawsand regulations, social and political relations both within and outsidevillages. Jodha (1986), for example, has documented how common propertyresources in drought-prone villages of India were gradually privatizedfollowing their increased economic values, leaving the poor de facto accessto only marginally productive wastelands.

1.7. Apart from market incentive structures and institutionalconstraints, every developing country has attempted to improve the welfareof its citizens through social and economic policies. Before drawing anypolicy conclusions on poverty-environment linkages, one has to look beyondjust the immediate physical environment, and correlate the largelyindividualistic survival strategies pursued by the poor to generate incomeand food security with:

(i) Public policies designed to provide Basic Needs services to poorcitizens, because of which economic expectations of the poorbegin improving;

(ii) Natural resource utilization by poor communities, taking intoaccount spatial choices that are available for earninglivelihoods between farming, off-farm activities and non-farmactivities.

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1.8. The issue for research becomes disentangling complex causalprocesses, and explaining whether poverty, public policies, institutions orcombinations of them cause changes in natural resource use. Analysis isfurther complicated because most developing countries do not have adequatetime series data on either poverty-related or environmental variables.However, since 1972, remote sensing images have been regularly collectedfor most parts of the world, providing snapshot images of natural resourceuse at points of t1me. By matching aggregative changes in land usecomputed from these data sources with socio-economic data sets, a simpleand quick method can be established to assess the nature of linkagesbetween poverty, public policies and an area's land and water resourceuses.

1.9. The object of this exercise is to provide one such practicalmethod of understanding the linkages between poverty, public policies andthe environment. The exercise has involved :

(a) Identifying land areas where obvious change in natural resourceattributes have occurred over a ten to fifteen year period inselected case studies,

(b) Tracing the causal factors of observed land use changes to publicpolicies and demographic factors by matching (a) with availablesocio-economic data sets.

1.10. At the first stage, gross changes in land use between two pointsof time (one from the 1970s and another from 1980s) are identified. Thesechanges are then traced back to their likely causes in available databases. If systemic causes could be attributed to either specific policiesor economic variables identifiable from available data sets, the directcausal role of poverty would (by inference) be proportionately lower.Three subregions, Sukabumi (West Java), Gombe (Northern Nigeria), andEkiti-Akoko (Southern Nigeria) were selected for analysis mainly becausesome data sets on the physical and economic systems were available.

1.11. The paper is divided into five sections. The second section laysout some conceptual ideas on the nature of poverty-environment linkages.Following this, the third and fourth sections describe the findings of theWes,; Java and Nigerian case studies. The final section summarizes somegeneral issues that may be of relevance in understanding the role ofpoverty, public policies and the environment in developing countries.

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II. THE NATURZ OF POVERTY-EUMRUENT LMOAGS

A. Poverty vs. Public Policies as Cause of Environmental Problems

2.1. Poverty and environment are descriptions of states: povertydescribing the state of human beings in a physical and social environmentunder low, socially unacceptable, consumption and income levels; andenvironment describing the state of land, water and atmospheric resourcesunder given or increasing consumption levels.

2.2. Poverty affects the use of land and water resources eitherdirectly or indirectly. The former occurs when the poor are forced byhunger and the lack of earning alternatives to mine land and waterendowments of their community, and ensuing degradation either reduces orpermanently impairs the productivity of those very resources. The lattertakes place when public policies alter incentive structures and redirectcapital and labor flows between sectors and regions. The poor, in thesesituations, are one of several actors who respond to economic opportunitiesby changing their established norms of using land and water resources.

2.3. The validity of the direct links between poverty and theenvironment can be questioned because:

(i) The poor lack both the physical energy (because of nutritionaldeficiencies) and the capital equipment (because of lack ofassets) to damage the environment in a significant way throughproduction. At best, they could degrade open access resources inthe periphery of their settlements during a search for "free"consumption goods. Given their low caloric and protein intakes,consumption of these non-food items would be fairly low. Evidencefrom India indicates that a slow deterioration of open accessresources can still take place if a large number of the poor areinvolved in these gathering activities (Jodha op. cit.).

(ii) The poor lack the knowledge beyond their own farming systemexperience, and also lack skills beyond supply of raw labor. Ifrisk aversion is added to these attributes, their propensity todestroy natural resources is limited. One could then argue thatit is only when the poor get transplanted to a new environmenthaving a radically different farming system through public policy- as in the Brazilian Amazon (Brown and Stone 1989), or throughopen door migration of Sahelian and Savanna farmers to the forestzone of Ivory Coast - that unsustainable use of natural resourcesbecomes observable.

(iii) The poor, as rational individuals - even when they have the optionof degrading the environment - would choose not to do so becauseof the likely damage to their limited future survival and incomeoptions.

Kortimore's studies in Kano, Nigeria, for example, providesevidence that smallholder tree conservation is preferred to short-term income even under price and famine pressure.

* 5 -

2.4. Enviromental degradation, according to this viewpoint, getscaused by:

- The poor being misdirected through public policies, which arebadly designed or poorly executed. Incomplete technologicaldiffusion, poorly managed delivery systems and defective economicpolicies could be the actual causal factors;

- The not-so-poor income maximizers utilizing labor of the poor forextractive production,

- The ultra poor, for whom day to day survival is so desperate, thatthe future income is heavily discounted in favor of currentincome. However, individuals in this category are also likely tohave very limited access to natural resources (see para 1.6above).

2.5. In any case, irrespective of whether either poverty or defectivepublic policies leads to resource degradation, rectifying the situation iscomplicated by poverty's indirect role in environmental degradation.Unlike the situation in industrialized countries, where natural resourcedegradation occurs as a by-product of identifiable wealth-generatingproduction or consumption, in a developing country causes and effects getinextricably mixed up. A policy designed to avoid externality-inducedcosts is clearly preferable to a reactive policy toward the natural andhuman environment.

B. A Conceptual_Framevork

2.6. Poverty has to be viewed from the perspective of both poorindividuals and poor communities. There are two reasons why this isnecessary. First, although strategies to earn incomes are largelyindividual-based microeconomic decisions, group norms and conventions playimportant roles in defining access to natural resources, as well as indetermining individual attitudes toward common property resources. Second,a separate emphasis on poor communities also highlights the fact that inmost developing countries, poverty is associated with the Nurksian lowproductivity and low capital formation aspects, and cannot be alleviated byredistributive policies alone. The linkages between poverty at both theindividual level and at the community level with the immediate and widerenvironment are presented in Table 1.

2.7. The four groupings presented in Table 1 interact with each otherin several ways. These are:

* The interaction between a goor individual.and his or herimmediateenvironment. Poverty is manifested by low income and consumptionlevels, with suboptimal choices being made in consumption of basicneeds (shelter, safe drinking water, education and health care).These suboptimal consumption decisions lower a person's physicalquality of life, and become visible as degraded physical habitatsand preventable environmental health risks.

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Table 1PovertV-Environmental Linkass

State of being poor State of the environment

Individual with Habitat covering living conditionslow consumption and and access to amenitieslow expectations offuture income

Society or human Wider concept of habitat coveringorganizations of land, water and atmospheric resourcespoor communities of the area or subregion

A second relation involves the individual with the land and waterresources around his or her living area. Poverty is indicative ofa lack of access to capital, technology and alternative sources oflivelihood, and could also be associated with suboptimalindividual production decisions, because of high private discountrates. Farmlands and pasturelands could get over-exploited,investments in soil conservation neglected, and crops could begrown on steep mountain slopes. One has to, however, view income-earning decisions of the poor keeping in perspective:

- Additions to the economic resource bases of existingcommunities through capital inflow, through either public orprivate investments,

- Rural-rural and rural-urban migration from capital-deficientsettlements to areas experiencing economic growth throughpublic and private investments that lead to improved incomeand employment opportunities.

Communities of Poor Individuals Interact With Their ImmediateEnironment. Social norms and conventions determine how communalopen access resources (village wells, common lands, modern servicefacilities provided by the State) get utilized. These sociallyenforced rules determine attitudes toward conservation and wastedisposal. For example, in most poor societies, recycling ofagricultural and domestic waste products is widelyinstitutionalized. Traditional housing materials in manycountries, similarly, utilize locally available natural resources.Socially determined conventions and norms usually change slowly,and are often unable to adapt to changed circumstances caused bydemographic and economic pressures. For example, in West Java, theextensive use of wood for housing is no longer a socially optimal

*7-

strategy because of widespread deforestation. Communities haveresorted to illegal felling of trees from (poorly policed)protected forests, rather than rationalizing current sociallywasteful methods of using a rapidly dwindling natural resource(See para 3.23).

* Lastly, communities also determine access to productive resourcessuch as land and water. Although most countries utilize aformalized legal system to define access to land and waterresources, high transactions costs in utilizing the formal systemresult in the continued importance of traditional rights of usage.The interface between the formal and informal system oftendetermines the incentives for sustained use of productive assetssuch as land. The Land Use Decree in Nigeria, for example,attempted to codify customary tenures on land in different partsof the country. Despite the well-intentioned provisions of thedecree, some of the rent-seeking elite have used statutory tenureas a means of over-riding customary land rights of villagecommunities (See para 4.27).

C. Role of Public Policies

2.8. Public policies affect one or several of the above relationships.Some illustrations given below sum up the types of poverty reductionpolicies that directly affect poverty-environment linkages:

- Some policies have been targeted at the individual poor produceror consumer; special credit programs, guaranteed producer supportprices, food subsidies, targeted nutrition programs are someexamples. These programs reduce the dependence of the poor on justthe natural resource base of their immediate environment.

A second group of more general policies have attempted to liftwhole communities out of the poverty trap. Many of these socialinfrastructural interventions are like 'software', seeking toaugment human capital of poor communities by spreading literacy,skill formation and preventive health care.

- A third group of policies have addressed spatial deficiencies byimproving the physical quality of life in communities, and byintegrating rural areas with market centers. Investments inphysical infrastructure are of this category, and have improvedthe 'hardware' through roads, permanent housing, communitybuildings (schools, health centers etc.), water supply,electricity, transport and communications. Investments of thiscategory increase the mobility of labor and capital betweenlocations.

- A fourth set of policies have attempted to remove or reduceinstitutional constraints by specifically addressing the problemof access of the poor to productive resources. Land reforms, landre-distribution, input delivery systems, construction ofneighborhood Farm Service Centers etc. are examples of suchpolicies.

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2.9. All these poverty alleviation measures, together, are designed toimprove access of poor individuals and communities to income earningopportunities by integrating their skills and work capabilities with thedynamic sectors of the economy. The policies, in theory, should reduce thedirect dependence of the poor on local natural resource bases forsubsistence. In practice, public investments and policies get affected byrent seeking behavior of the elite, and filter down to poor individuals andcommunities unevenly (Jagannathan op cit). Spatial and distributionalequity have, consequently, rarely been maintained.

2.10. Major cities, economically advanced regions, and towns typicallyreceive disproportionate shares of investments in terms of both softwareand hardware. The economic structure usually reinforces these trends bycreating forward and backward multipliers in and around areas of populationdensity because informal sector income and employment opportunities areusually concentrated around production and trading nodes.

2.11. The spatial dynamics of povercy ultimately determines the patternof land and water degradation in even remote and physically isolated ruralcommunities. Inter-relations between human population mobility, search forincome security, public policies and environmental degradation are key tounderstanding poverty-environment linkages.

2.12. The consequences can be dramatic from country to country. Indensely populated areas such as Java, very high densities (exceeding 700persons per square kilometer even in rural areas) have been accompanied bythe generation of a wide range of alternative income earning opportunitiesprimarily in the tertiary sector (transportation, domestic service, tradeand construction). With improved transport and communications, the ruralpoor are able to commute to towns for part-time or full-time work. InNigeria, although similar vocations in the tertiary sector have beenreported, the extent of spatial integration between rural and urban areasappears to be much less, resulting in less employment creation in ruralareas. In both countries, public investments, notably in highway networks,inter-city transportation and urban development have greatly expandedpopulation mobility of the poor. At the same time, the indirect effects ofpoverty on the environment are severe: negative externalities in the formof congestion, land and water pollution.

2.13. In the three preliminary studies, two large countries from Asiaand Africa were chosen primarily because of data availability, and becausethey represent three distinct agro-climatic regions. West Java is typicalof densely populated rice-growing areas of Asia. Gombe is a sample areafrom the Guinea Savanna belt of West Africa, while Ekiti-Akoko represents asample area from the Tropical Rainforest Belt.

D. Methodolony

2.14. The case studies identify changes in natural resource bases inselected areas by comparing temporal remote sensing imageries, and looks atthe likely economic and demographic explanations by using available socio-economic data. The reasons for examining the consequences beforeunderstanding the causality were two-fold. First, there are as yet no

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clear yardsticks of assessing qualitative changes in resource use indeveloping countries, although environmental literature is replete withgeneral statements such as how forests are being encroached by land-hungrypeasants, marginal farmlands depleted of their nutrients, river systems arebeing polluted by sewage from poor settlements, and so on. Corroboratingthese general statements with empirical data becomes difficult becauseinformation on land, forest and water resource characteristics is oftenunavailable. Unless a set of parameters of physical changes is worked out,it becomes difficult to translate general statements into specificoperatienal concerns. Second, identifying the results before understandingthe causes is more practical because socio-economic causality is a resultof highly complex interactions among several independent explanatoryvariables. These variables affect resource use changes both directly (byaltering incentive structures in the economic system and redirectingcapital flows), and indirectly (by affecting movements of poor individualsin search of food and income security). It is more cost-effective topinpoint and analyze the causes of ecological changes in identifiablelocations, rather than disentangling complex causal processes first andthen looking at the consequences on natural resource use.

2.15. Developing a method of identifying natural resource changes was,therefore, considered a pre-requisite for economic analysis. The idealsolution, if resources had permitted, would have been to design continuousmonitoring systems for flow variables such as soil erosion rates, soilnutrient levels, areas deforested or exposed as degraded lands, b.o.d. andc.o.d. content of water, suspended particulate matter in the atmosphereetc. Such an effort requires large budgetary commitments, and is notaffordable for most developing countries. A second-best solution was todevelop cost-effective and simpler parameters of stock changes by computingtemporal area statistics of land and water use. Temporal remote sensingimageries provided a relatively inexpensive, replicable and value-freebasis of identifying aggregate stock changes in these natural resourceendowments.

2.16. The methodology consisted of the following steps:

* First, study areas ranging from 4,000 to 10,000 square kilometerswere identified primarily on the basis of availability ofsupplementary data on natural resources of the subregion.

* Second, LANDSAT images for two time periods (one from the mid1970s and another from the mid 1980s) were used as basic referencematerial for visually identifying land and water use changes.Visual changes observed over a decade helped identify resource usechanges, particularly in terms of land cleared of vegetativecover, growth of human settlements, areal farming changes etc. Onecould, consequently, restrict further research to spatiallymanageable micro-regions where noticeable physical changes hadtaken place.

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* Third, causal factors in the identified micro-regions wereanalyzed by using socio-economic data. Specifically, availableinformation on farm-nonfarm-urban informal sector linkages, dataon rural-rural and rural-urban migration, public investments andinstitutional aspects (access to land, inequality in assetholdings) were combined together to set up preliminary hypotheseson the nature of poverty-environment linkages.

2.17. The selection of three study regions for this analysis from WestJava (Indonesia) and Nigeria was largely determined by the availability ofsocio-economic and supplementary natural resources data. The studies havebeen reported separately in detail, and the following two sections areconfined to discussing some of the findings of interest.

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III. CASR STUDY OF KABUATEN SURABUMI (VEST JAVA)

3.1. A Dutch consulting company, Haskoning, had been commissioned bythe West Javan Government to prepare an environmental profile for theprovince. Several data sets on natural resources and socio-economicvariables were collected and analyzed in their report (Haskoning 1987). Ofparticular interest to this study are two remote sensing images for June1976 and May 1986 for Kabupaten Sukabumi that were digitized and used toidentify the land and water use changes in the Kabupaten or district. Inthis section an attempt is made to trace back their causes.

A. Chantes-in Land Use in-the Haskoning Stud!

3.2. The Haskoning study has indicated a reduction in forest cover byabout 27 per cent between 1976 and 1986 in Sukabumi, with the currentforest cover being almost half the official forest statistics. Accordingto the latter, there were 98,000 hectares of forests in 1986, while theremote sensing estimate was only 53,000 hectares. Overlaying sub-district(kecamatan) boundaries on deforested areas, ten kecamatans appear to havebeen severely affected by deforestation. The largest decreases have takenplace in subdistricts that had (i) relatively low population densities, and(ii) improved road connections to the provincial highway system.

Table 2Changes in Forest Cover in Kabupaten Sukabumi

(1976-1986)

Chan&e f= forest Sg: Area (hectares)

(a) Shrubland 19,864 38

(b) Mixed garden 7,133 14

(c) Estate 5,014 10

(d) Uncovered 1,999 4

(e) Built-up area 13,000 25

(f) Miscellaneous 5,230 9

Source: Haskoning (1987)

3.3. The interesting point revealed by Table 2 is that in about halfthe area of deforestation, land use has been changed to mixed gardens,estates and built-up areas, all obviously driven by market-related factors.These economic uses satisfy production or consumption requirements, and aresustainable with appropriate economic and institutional policies. Theremaining area of apparent deforestation has occurred in the sparselypopulated kecamatans, where conversion from forests to shrublands havetaken place to satisfy consumptior demand of wood and other land basedmaterials in West Java and Jakarta.

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3.4. Changes in land use in the district are different between theareas north and south of the river Cimandiri (which dissects the total areainto two halves). North of Cimandiri river are some of the most denselypopulated subdistricts of Java, with population densities exceeding 900persons per sq.km. In this area, the two remote sensing images suggest asystematic replacement of shrublands by rubber, tea, coconuts and cloveestates/gardens on hill slopes with gradients between 2% and 15%. Allthese crops are important earners of foreign exchange, and reflect tl.esuccess of actively propagated policies designed to diversify the country'sexport base. With proper extension support, estates and mixed gardenscould arrest soil erosion and simultaneously provide earning opportunitiesfor the rural poor. Two other notable changes that appear in proximity ofeach other are the increases in water areas (because of public and privateinvestments in irrigation), and increases in areas classified as bare lands(especially close to river beds).

3.5. South of the Cimandiri river, the spread of estates and mixedgardens has been more dispersed. ort of the southern kecamatans have bothlower population densities and poorer land capabilities for farming. Asignificant change has been in the southwestern corner of the district,where a large tract of lowland forests (in the Cikepuh forest reserves) wasreported to have been cleared extensively.

3.6 Process of environmental degradation: The Haskoning data suggeststhe conversion of forested areas to economic use following a sequence ofchanges.

ESTATES -* BUILT-UP AREASFOREST -- * SHRUBLANDS -- -E STATES

MIXED GARDENS -+ BARE LANDS

The conversion of forest lands to shrubs appears as the first step. By 1976itself, large tracts of what are ailt classified forests had beenconverted to other uses in the northern areas of the district. Between 1976and 1986 all remaining sub-montane and coastal forests were severelydegraded. The most serious damage to forests has taken place close to thehighway system. Highway investments in the last decade have ensured that noarea of the district is more than 20 kilometers from good roads, making allremaining forested areas susceptible to illegal felling of trees, mining orquarrying.

3.7. Next, in the sequence of changes appears to be the conversion ofshrublands into economic uses, notably as estates or mixed gardens. Thischange is - in theory at any rate - both environmentally sustainable, andincome augmenting. Dry land agricultural area, which is widespread in theunirrigated areas, does not appear to have changed substantially in area,although dry land paddy pr-duction increased through yield intensification(BPS 1986).

3.8. The only evidence of poverty-related unsustainable farmingpractices has occurred in abandoned/non-productive estates, whichconstitute about six per cent of the district's estate area. Theseproperties have reportedly been invaded by landless cultivators and

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displaced estate workers. Not having any legal titles to the lands, thesepersons have used ecologically destructive slash and burn methods ofcultivation. Among the estates/garden crops, soil losses have beenreported only in the tea estates during the immature phase of tree cropgrowth, until the crop canopy closed (Haskoning op cit).

3.9. The emergence of bare lands has generally occurred in areas where:

- Farmers utilized very steep slopes for agriculture;

* Land was mined for clay, gravel or limestone;

- Abandoned estates were illegally farmed by shifting cultivators.

3.10. Finally, the Haskoning study indicates a very rapid increase inbuilt-up areas, mainly through the spread of human settlements intoadjacent shrublands, forests and farmlands. In aggregate terms, however, nodecline in area under vegetative cover between 1976 and 1986 was visible inthe densely populated subdistricts, perhaps because estates and mixedgardens extended vegetative cover on alreadv deforested lands.

3.11. More than deforestation, current environmental problems in thisarea relate to unregulated mining of mineral resources, clay, gravel andthe over-exploitation of groundwater in the Sukabumi acquifer (Haskoning opcit). The study indicates that the economic system (and by inference notpoverty) is the key determinant of land and water use. What is apparent isthat market incentive structures, public investments in infrastructure,agricultural and macro-economic policies appear to be the main causalfactors behind observed changes in land use. Each of these factors arediscussed below, with the concluding paragraph evaluating the role ofpoverty in explaining environmental change in West Java.

B. Rural Economic Changes, 1976-1986

3.12. Between 1976 and 1986, West Java witnessed increases in paddyproduction through yield intensification, spread of tree crop cultivation,and the widespread diffusion of commercialization. Investments inimproving farm productivity, the buying and selling activities of State-supported agencies and private traders resulted in increased cash flowsbetween farms and market centers. Favorable relative price movements offarm products and inputs, availability of critical inputs like seeds,fertilizers and pesticides, and the diffusion of appropriate technologyallowed agricultural production of food crops and plantation crops toregister significant gains. The growth of a commercialized rural economy,rural-urban integration of economic activities was made possible by socialand physical infrastructural investments. A two-way flow of labor andcapital between the urban and rural economies took place, with thefollowing results:

(i) Farmers who received higher cash incomes altered their consumptionpatterns, and consequently generated small multiplier effects inoff-farm, labor-intensive supplementary vocations for landless'workers and marginal farmers;

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(ii) Improved incentives for non-traditional off-farm activitieslinked to urban market demand, such as production of fish, meat,poultry and other products. Remenyi (1986), for example, hasestimated a four-fold increase in milk supplies from West Java tourban areas between 1978 and 1984.

(iii) Several low income, direct earning opportunities (becak driving,casual labor, hawking of merchandise, food preparation, etc.) wereutilized in the urban informal sector of cities like Jakarta andBandung.

3.13. Household budget studies indicate that these earning opportunitieshave altered the profile of consumption expenditure among the poor. On anaverage, rice (food) consumption expenditure declined in favor of non-foodexpenditure, while the population consuming more than 320 kg of riceequivalent increased between 1970 and 1976 (Hartmann 1985, quoting Sundrumand Booth).

3.14. Estimates indicate that more than one half of West Javan ruralhouseholds are landless, and that about 60 per cent of landowninghouseholds owned less than 0.5 hectares of land (Hartmann 1985, Douglass1987). Although no efforts had been made to reduce the inequitabledistribution of land, West Java's poverty profile improved because thegrowth of income earning opportunities provided alternative sourceslivelihoods for these persons (Chandler 1984, Hartmann 1985).

3.15. The relative decline in poverty levels took place throughoccupational multiplicity among the poor; agricultural earnings weresupplemented with cash incomes from other labor-intensive, low returnactivities in trade, construction, transport sectors. Rietveld's studyshows that landless farmers working on farms derived 64 per cent of theirincomes from non-agricultural activities. For farm households withholdings below 0.50 hectares, the percentage dropped to 55, and amonghouseholds cxwning between 1 to 1.99 hectares of farmland, the percentageremained 40 per cent (Rietveld 1986).

3.16. The high proportion of non-agricultural income sources for eventhe poor suggests a widespread use of the market system for incomegeneration and employment. Mining their immediate natural resource basesfor survival or subsistence requirements appears to have been unnecessary.

C. Role of Public Policies

3.17. Public policies of the Indonesian Government in the last decadehave attempted to maximize rice and tree crops production through acombination of subsidies, easy credit, producer support prices, andinfrastructural investments. Notable among them has been the BIMAS andINNAS rice programs. The expansion of agricultural production and incomeswere possible because of three factors - availability of appropriatetechnology, favorable relative price movements of crops and inputs,availability of critical inputs such as fertilizers and water for farmers(Sjahrir 1986, Tjondoronigoro 1985).

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3.18. Other incentives such as the Village Development AssistancePi,wgram provided subsidies for local development initiatives. Since themid-1970s efforts have been made to reach out to special target groups,such as women traders, artisans, small home based industries through creditsupport, training, vocational guidance and extension (Hartmann op cit,Patten et al 1983, Tjokrowinoto 1982).

3.19. Imortance of enabling public investments: One of the mostsignificant contributors to the integration of the rural and urbaneconomies has been public investments in 'enabling' infrastructure,covering physical infrastructure, education and health, through whichvillage populations have been able to seize income earning opportunities.The major facilitator of rural-urban economic linkages has beenimprovements in transport and communications brought about by the expansionof road networks and by the growth in public bus, truck, and motor cyclepopulations. By the mid-1980s, most villages were within a few kilometersaccess of public transportation. In a study of population mobility in themid-1970s, Hugo (1981) found that the rapid expansion of cheap bus serviceswithin the province -reatly expanded circular migration and commutingbetween villages and sities. These 'temporary' migrants were left out ofofficial statistics. According to his estimates, based on 14 villages inWest Java, the temporary migration figures were roughly double permanentmigration rates recorded in the 1971 Census. Another study based on SAEdata appears to reinforce these arguments (Manning 1986).

3.20. Several other enabling investments have helped in the integrationof rural communities with the market system. Health service facilitieswere greatly expanded, increasing life expectancy and reducing infantmortality rates. A drop in the country's total fertility rate of nearlyone child per woman took place in the country between the late 1960s andthe late 1970s (Sjahrir op cit). At the same time, however, the impact ofpast population growth has been so great that even with a successful birthcontrol program, West Java's population is expected to increase by 40 percent between 1985 and 2005 (Haskoning op cit).

3.21. Primary schorling facilities were also greatly expanded. By 1984enrollment rates in primary schools reached 100 per cent, for the seven totwelve age group, making universal literacy an attainable goal (Sjahrir opcit). Improving literacy rates, higher life expectancy and smallerfamilies have improved work force participation rates, and led to morerural-urban migration.

D. Poverty and Environmental Degradation

3.22. The analysis of the economic system and public policies abovesuggests that the poor have by and large turned to the market system fortheir livelihoods. The Haskoning data also suggests that major changes innatural resource use can be traced to economic and policy variables. Theinformal sector, in both rural and urban areas has acted as a vast sponge,absorbing the growing population of job seekers. The burden of poverty isbeing most acutely felt in the densely populated settlements in terms ofsub-standard housing, congestion, pollution, and health risks. Untreatedsolid and liquid wastes pollute local rivers, and downstream settlements(Haskoning op cit).

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3.23. Negative externalities of poor human settlements is felt by thesurrounding natural resource base of an area. The Haskoning study hasestimated fuel wood consumption in rural areas to range between 0.43 and0.72 cubic meters per person, all of which gets harvested as free goodsfrom village common lands. When the poor migrate to the city, in anattempt to minimize cash expenditures, they search for "free" goods fromsurrounding open access resources (including poorly policed publicforests). If the relative pricing of substitutes to these free goods isunfavorable, the pressure on the latter would increase. A study by WorldBank (1989) indicates that the urban retail price of kerosene in Indonesiahas been increasing relative to fuelwood prices, and one could expect thepressures of illegal felling of trees to have continued unabated.

3.24. Apart from the pressures of poor human settlements, economicfactors have led to excess demand for products from the area's naturalresource base, covering the forest cover, sand, clay and gravel. Forexample, BPS data (1976) indicate'that housing structures in Indonesia byconvention use wood and bamboo extensively, irrespective of income levels.If demand patterns remain unchanged, the high income elasticity of demandfor wood products would continue to make tree felling lucrative. For WestJava alone, the Haskoning study has estimated an annual demand of utilityand construction wood of 1 million cubic meters; a figure substantiallyhigher than local state forest production. Wood, as with most housingconstruction materials, has a low volume:value ratio, and supply areas withlow transport costs expectedly face the highest pressure of felling.Poorly policed forests and river beds (for sand and gravel) in proximity todemand centers would, predictably, be the first to experience opportunisticmining of resources by private entrepreneurs, unless prohibitoryregulations are strictly enforced.

3.25. Finally, another critical area of environmental concern is thevery high population concentrations in erosion-sensitive watersheds ofimportant rivers. The Haskoning study has indicated that eight districttowns of the province are located in environmentally fragile areas, andmost have rapidly growing populations. Tasikmalaya (an upland city) forexample, has an annual population growth rate of over 3 per cent between1971 and 1980.

3.26. Other examples of negative externalities reported in the Haskoningstudy are: - 6

- Increased pollution loads on rivers because of industrial andmunicipal discharges.

- Intensification of mining of soil, gravel, clay and limestone inthe vicinity because of urban housing and construction activities.

These externalities, together with mining of acquifers in rural areas,misapplication of chemical fertilizers and pesticides appear to be theserious environmental problems of the area. The role of poverty inenvironmental degradation has thus been at best indirect. The directcauses of environmental degradation require policy corrections, innovationsand physical investments.

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3.27. The solution lies in devising appropriate economic andinstitutional policies so that labor and capital flows are guided toenvironmentally optimal locations. Second, one can consider usingsubsidies on purely environmental grounds, so that the poor and the richalike do not mine open access and poorly policed natural resources. Forexample, construction materials supplied from other Indonesian islandshaving adequate natural wealth could be subsidized for Javanese residentsso that the mining of West Java's dwindling natural resources is reduced.Third, regulatory and policing institutions have to be greatly strengthenedon common property resources. In sum, the answers to environmentaldegradation in Sukabumi have to be found in changing public policies,enforcing regulations and strengthening institutions. The role of poorindviduals and poor communities gets defined within the parameters set bythb e social and economic policies.

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IV. TWO CASE STUDIES FROM NIGERIA

4.1. Two case studies from the Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko areas providecontrasting examples to the West Javan case study. These two areas fallwithin agro-ecologically distinct zones of Sub-Saharan Africa; Gombe is anexample from the Savanna belt, while Ekiti-Akoko lies in the tropicalrainforest zone. The choice of the two areas was again, largely dictatedby the relatively better availability of physical and socioeconomic databecause of their coverage by World Bank-assisted Agricultural DevelopmentProjects (ADPs).

4.2. Unlike the West Java study, where the Haskoning data base providedan invaluable foundation for analysis, the Nigerian studies requiredsearching available data sets for relevant information on physical andsocio-economic characteristics. In both Gombe and Ekiti Akoko, remotesensing images from the 1970s and 1980s had to be visually examined andrelated to other available maps and data bases, so that gross changes inland and water use in the intervening period could be evaluated.

4.3. Changes in the physical system were measured by overlaying mapsshowing land use and soil capabilities on remote sensing images of two timeperiods. The manual overlay method was not as technically elegant as thedigital overlays used by the Haskoning study for West Java. One has tohowever, balance technical sophistication with the reliability of availabledata sets. Compared to Java, Nigerian data on both the physical and socio-economic systems are considerably weaker in accuracy and coverage. Forexample, no reliable population estimates are available in the countrysince the 1950s; there are no agricultural census data bases; cadastralsurveys of land are virtually non-existent, and information on soils,slopes and land rights are subject to gross generalizations. There areserious risks of compounding existing errors in data bases by attemptingambitious digital exercises without adequate ground truthing. In this deskstudy the object has been only to test the validity of the method: ofderiving generalizations on gross changes in the physical system as asurrogate for (unavailable) data detailing land and water use changes.

A. Capabilities of the Physical System

4.4. An assessment of land capabilities was made from existing datasets in the two study areas. In Gombe, information on the physical systemwas obtained from the Bauchi State Atlas. The Atlas has computed landcapabilities by relating data sets on soils (productivity, erosivity,slopes and suitability), water availability (rainfall, acquifers, waterbodies), climate and vegetation with each other to qualitatively classifyagro-ecological potentials in four major categories. For Ekiti-Akoko,information from maps used during the preparation of the AgriculturalDevelopment Project was divided into three categories:

- The well-drained Ondo soils, with slopes less than 7 per cent havebeen classified as the 'best suited lands'.

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- The medium capability lands are the Iwo soils, which have coarsertextures and more frequent rock outcrops.

* Lands with low capabilities covered all areas with slopes greaterthan 7 per cent, where bare soils are prone to severe erosionrisks because of the intensity of run-off.

Risks of soil erosion were common to both Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko, but wateravailability was a binding constraint only in the former study area. Toensure comparability between the two study areas, the four-foldclassification of land potentials in Gombe was reduced to three groupings;moderately good farming lands, lands with generally inferior potentials,and lands with high erosion risks. Table 3 contrasts the land capabilitiesof the two study areas using this classification.

Table 3Land Classification in Gobe and Ekiti Akoko

Gomba Ekiti Akoko

Land with good potential (%) 30 48

Land with generallyinferior potential (t) 33 16

Erodible lands (%) 37 36

Approximate areasampled (sq kms) 6400 3600

§ourcg: Bauchi State Atlas and IBRD map 14232

4.5. The land capability classification above has to be interpretedonly as a XaLL distribution of good, average and erodible farmlands inthe two study areas. Comparing across the two study regions is clearlyinappropriate because the groupings are uniquely specific to the respectiveecological zones. Lands with 'good potentials' in r.kiti-Akoko, forexample, can support larger farming populations than similarly classifiedlands in Gombe. Perhaps the only common feature is the roughly equalproportion of lands subjected to erosion risks in Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko,although erosion-prone lands in Gombe are often interspersed among 'bestsuited' alluvial farmlands of the Gombe-Kumo belt.

4.6. By overlaying available data on population and human settlementson land use potentials, one observes, just as in Sukabumi, thatagricultural and land clearing activities have occurred on better suitedlands. In the Ekiti-Akoko area, higher population densities and clearingof vegetation were observable on the better endowed Ondo soils having lessthan 7% slopes. In Gombe, land clearing has taken place on the relativelygood soils between Gombe and Kumo, and on the heavy clay soils alongriverine tracts.

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B. Chanmes in Land Use Between the 1970s and 1980s

4.7. Visual interpretations of vegetative cover changes werefacilitated by contrasting false colors in the remote sensing imageries.In Ekiti-Akoko, sharply contrasting colors of vegetative and tree cover (inred), cleared land (in light green) and human settlements (turquoise blue)were visible. In Gombe, the spread of fadama cultivation (red), reductionin uncultivated tracts of clay soils (dark browni and tertiary sandstonesof the low farming potential areas of the Kerri Kerri plateau (light brown)could also be visually identified. These visual interpretations wereverified with ground truth from several sources, including a Nigerianeconomic geographer, ADP data sets, Bauchi State Atlas, and the ODA studyof the land resources of Northern Nigeria conducted in 1971.

4.8. The following were the significant findings of the study:

(i) Major changes in land use occurred on the periphery of largertowns, along roads, and at major highway intersections. In Ekiti-Akoko a ribbon pattern of land clearing is very obvious: allhighways in the project area can be visually identified in the1987 LANDSAT imagery. In Gombe, similar road networks could beidentified in a ten kilometer radius around Gombe town. Publicinvestments in roads appear to have been major contributors to theobserved changes in land utilization patterns in both study areas.

(ii) The clearing of lands for farming has generally taken place onbetter suited lands (as defined in Table 3). In the Ekiti-Akokoimage for 1987, lands not connected to the highway systemexperienced very little changes in red color (vegetative cover),and white signatures (usually a sign of bare or degraded lands)were not observable. In the Gombe image, the most significantchange was the diffusion of farming in uncultivated areas withgood farming potentials. Visual examination in Gombe could nothowever, distinguish between bare lands, human settlements withthatched roofs and fallow farmlands. Overall, both images suggestthat food crop farming has spread to better suited and accessibleagricultural lands.

(iii) Land clearing in Gme took place in areas that were earlierinaccessible (in the southwest), and in the heavy clay soils zone.Available (although scanty) socioeconomic data suggest thatextensive farming spread into the areas serviced by new roads.ADP studies indicate that there has been a widespread diffusion oflabor-saving oxen cultivation over these areas, which account forthe significant areal increase observable.

(iv) In Ekiti-Akoko, most cleared lands appear around existingsettlements and road networks, with some of the isolated areasactually experiencing re-vegetation. Changes in land utilizationin areas adjacent to large towns and highway networks areindicative of the spreading commercial farming of food crops(through crop switching from tree crops). Again, as in Gombe, ADPdata do not indicate any significant improvements in average

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productivities of food crops grown in these areas. Anothersignificant change has been the virtual disappearance of the Edaand Agbe reserve forests, both located close to areas of highpopulation density, in the 1987 image.

(v) In Gombe the expansion of irrigated fadama agriculture on rivervalley bottomlands-was clearly visible. Large tracts of landbelow the Dadinkowa dam on the river Gongola had been used forirrigated vegetable cultivation. In the Ekiti-Akoko area, perhapsbecause of its location in the tropical rainforest belt, noanalogous changes were visible in land use along rivers and waterbodies.

(vi) The growth in human settlements was confined to existing towns andvillages in both study areas. Increased flows of publicinvestments into social infrastructure (education, health, watersupply) perhaps increased the attractiveness of towns for ruralresidents.

(vii) In both areas vegetative cover was cleared around urban centers.In the Ekiti-Akoko area, major changes have taken place around allfive Local Government Area headquarters, and in other townslocated on the highway network. In the Gombe area, populationdensity and settlement sizes were considerably smaller, andvisible changes to a comparable degree were visible only aroundthe largest town of Gombe. Table 4 summarizes some of theprincipal findings.

C. Implications of the Visual Stud! for Poverty and Policy Analyais

4.9. The visual examination of remote sensing images has identifiedmicro-regions that have exhibited systemic changes in land use.Specifically, the following areas appear to fit a consistent spatialpattern of change:

Gonbe area

- A periphery of ten kilometer radius around Gombe town, wheremaximum changes in land use appear to have taken place between1976 and 1987

- Heavy clay soils to the west of Kumo, which have been broughtunder cultivation with new road investments

- River valley bottomlands and fadama lands south of the Dadinkowadam, where irrigated farming has diffused

- Kerri Kerri plateau fringes to the west of Pindiga, where landdegradation appears to have taken place

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Table -4Chanjes in Land Use Around Principal Towns

zM Area of identifiable 'khan..qjince122change (sq kilometers)

(a) Mkiti-Akoko

Ikare-Oka Oka-Erushu-Ogbabi belt 66 85

Arigidi-Osin belt 31 96

Ado Ekiti 25 75

Omuo 7 73

Ikole 13 81

Other townson federal roads 17 74

Remaining towns 22 94

Other areas 30 95

(b) Gombe area % change since 1976

Gombe town 13 233

Source: LANDSAT imagery

Ekiti-Akoko area

- Urban peripheries of Ado Ekiti, Ikole, Ikare, Omuo, which areareas of greatest land use changes

- Ribbon development around highways, particularly between Ifaki-Ikole-Omuo.

- Periphery of the reservoir on river Osse

- Disappearance of forests at the Eda and Agbe forest reserves

4.10. Changes in land and water use appear to be closely related tohuman settlements, economic policies and public investments. In West Java,many of the available socio-economic studies and reports could be directlyrelated to the observed physical changes in land and water uses. Bycontrast, in both Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko village-level studies and socio-economic data bases were practically non-existent. The lack of any

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reliable Census for more than two decades further weakened the analysis.However, limited available data suggest that changes in natural resourceuses, just as in West Java, appear to have been influenced by market forces(increase in food prices, changes in relative prices between food crops andtree crops), by infrastructural investments (road networks, health andsocial infrastructure), and specific ADP policies, such as fertilizersubsidies, location of farm service centers, investments in rural watersupplies etc.).

4.11. The weight of visible evidence points to the importance ofincentive structures. institutions and public policiep in explainingchanges in natural resource usage. Four sets of factors could be used,just as in West Java, to explain the observed changes in land and wateruse. These are:

(i) The degree of market integration of economic activities;

(ii) ADP policies designed to improve food production;

(iii) Investments in basic needs and infrastructure;

(iv) Prevailing patterns of inequality of income and access to land.

(i) Market Integration of Economic Activities

4.12. The rural Nigerian economy has a long history of responding tofavorable market signals, with areas under cocoa, cotton, groundnutsexpanding rapidly when farmgate prices were remunerative (Bates 1981). Inthe post-SAL period, improvements in terms of trade for food crops has ledto areal expansions of maize, cassava, rice and yams. Despite this trend,unlike West Java, rural income multipliers for the poor have been fairlylow. Haggblade and Hazell (1987) discuss the causes, and a summary oftheir arguments has validity for both study areas.

4.13. First, backward processing linkages in the rural nonf4rm sectorare very low. Fertilizers, agricultural implements and constructionmaterials -the main generators of linkage effects in West Java - all hadlower diffusion rates because there had been no equivalent of the Asian"green revolution". In West Java, by contrast, wetland paddy, tree cropproduction and input consumption provided major backward and forwardprocessing linkages in the rural sector. Moreover, past policies ofdistributing inputs and farming implements through centralized parastatalsand Farm Service Centers inhibited microenterprise development in ruralareas.

4.14. Second, forward processing linkages in rural areas were alsolimited despite the substantial processing requirements of traditional foodcrops such as cassava and maize that have benefitted from price increasesin the post-SAL period. ADP food processing studies (AMDEC 1984) indicatethat manual techniques employed by village women to process cassava ormaize produce outputs were too time-intensive to generate adequatemarketable surpluses. The lack of satisfactory storage infrastructure andhigh transport costs in rural areas have further prevented rural householdfood processing units capturing urban market shares (Durojaiye and Aihonsu1988).

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4.15. An ADP study of gari processing in Omuo town (Ekiti-Akoko) servesas a useful illustration of why towns, rather than villages have benefittedfrom forward processing linkages. Producers informally shared the costs ofinvesting in a time-saving, but expensive poitable motorized grater forprocessing cassava. By collectively purchasing raw cassava and otherinputs from local wholesale traders, risks of irregular supply have beenminimized, and many women microentrepreneurs have been able to successfullycompete against bulk producers of gari (AMDEC 1984).

4.16. Third, consumption linkages in demand for rural services such asconstruction, transport and durables depend on rural economic growth rates.In an economy where most forward and backward linkages have been restrictedto urban areas, one could expect consumption linkages to be confined tourban and peri-urban areas as well.

4.17. Inadequate generation of non-farm incomes in rural areas has beenmirrored by substantial employment multipliers being observed in Nigerianurban and peri-urban areas. Ukwu (1982) has estimated tertiary sector(distribution) activities to account for 24 per cent of Gross DomesticProduct in Nigeria in 1982, and to employ about 15 per cent of the workforce. He estimates double as many traders in urban areas as in ruralareas. Together with the labor requirements of the construction and otherservices sector, urban and semi-urban areas are locations with betterincome earning opportunities. Unlike West Java, where the rural and urbaneconomies became spatially integrated through private and publicinvestments, in areas like Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko, the success of ruraldevelopment efforts could be expected to depend largely on the nature anddirection of public investments, a topic that will be discussed next.

(11) Role of ADP Policies

4.18. Between 1972 and 1986 both Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko received largepublic investments through the Agricultural Development Projects (ADPs),designed to promote food production and rural development. These resourceinflows complemented other nation-wide physical investments in transport,communications and in social infrastructure (education, health, watersupply).

4.19. In both Gombe and Ekiti-Akoko, the ADPs were designed to correctsome of the rural-urban imbalances discussed above, and disseminate thebenefits of modern technology to households with small agriculturalholdings. Increases in food crop production (observable as changes in landuse in the LANDSAT images and from some farm-level studies), notably inmaize, attest to successes in the programs. The evidence in both studyareas suggest, however, that area expansions were not accompanied by yieldintensification. There is also no evidence of the growth of occupationalmultiplicity, non-farm incomes and circular migration as in West Java.

4.20. The lack of productivity gains in Gombe is evident despiteincreased consumption of chemical fertilizers in maize cultivation duringthe last fifteen years. In Ekiti-Akoko, by contrast, the total quantity offertilizers sold was barely a fifth of the appraised target because theywere not considered suitable for widely grown staple root crops (Agunbiade1988).

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4.21. The experience of diffusing other farm input has been similarlymixed. In Gombe, oxen cultivation became widespread, although leading toextensive rather than intensive agriculture by affluent farmers (Clough andWilliams 1987). In Ekiti-Akoko, the Advanced Services Package and BasicServices Package had been designed to diffuse minimum tillage practices andintroduce scientific methods into crop production. The use of herbicides,insecticides, better quality seeds and farm machinery were however, farbelow appraised estimates (APMEPU 1988).

4.22. Another set of problems can be attributed to organizational andmanagement factors. A study of farm mechanization in Ondo state byFaborode (1984) serves as a useful illustration of why state-sponsoredrural development programs did not galvanize agricultural development. Inthe ntire state of Ondo (including the Ekiti-Akoko area) there were only218 tractors in 1983, of which 96 per cent were owned by government farms.These tractors had to service about 190,000 hectares of land under foodcrops in a fairly rugged terrain. Poor operations and maintenance of thesemachines further diluted their effectiveness - about 23 per cent were notworking because of either mechanical defects or lack of spare parts.Farmers interviewed by the author complained of poor quality of service,frequent breakdown of machinery and problems of timeliness in machineavailability. Tractor hiring services were confined to areas in thevicinity of the Farm Service Centers having good road access.

(iii) Role of Other Enabling Investments

4.23. Infrastructural projects under the ADPs and other nationally-sponsored projects had several other impacts on the project areas. In bothGombe and Ekiti-Akoko, road access was improved, but investments had to bespread relatively thinly across when compared to relatively compact,densely populated areas like Sukabumi. In Gonbe, scarcity of drinkingwater has been a major problem in many settlements, and efforts have beenmade to provide a minimum water supply infrastructure (WARDROP 1986). Theborehole program could not be extended to the heavy clay soils opened up byanimal traction to agriculture, and few human settlements are visible closeto these areas of good farming potentials. In Ekiti-Akoko drinking watersupply has not been a problem, although the rural areas have beeninadequately serviced by safe drinking water sources (Ondo Survey 1986).

4.24. Diffusion of primary schools: The most notable achievement of thelast two decades has been the spread of primary schools in rural areasunder the Universal Primary Education program, and a parallel growth indemand for schooling even among poor farm families. In Ondo state freeeducation was introduced by 1979 itself, and school enrollments rose fromabout 580,000 in 1979-80 to over 700,000 in 1984-85. In Bauchi state,progress was not as impressive, but has been around 350,000 in 1984-85 (FOS1985).

4.25. This expansion of schooling has led to tremendous pressures oninstitutions for higher learning in the cities. Only between a fifth and atenth of applicants could be admitted to Universities. For the others,literacy has led to increased expectations, without a corresponding growthof farm and non-farm income opportunities in rural areas. Growingpopulations of school leavers are drawn to cities in search of income andemployment in the urban informal sector.

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(iv) Inequalities in Access to Resources

4.26. Unlike West Java, the rural areas of both Gombe and Ekiti-Akokohad fewer opportunities for the poor to earn incomes outside the farmsector, unless they migrated to urban areas. Within the farm sector, theirutilization of natural resources would depend on institutional factors thatdetermined access to land. The few available studies suggest thatinequalities in land holdings have been noticeable in both the study areas.In Gombe, over a third of farms were reported to be less than two hectaresin size. Another study of income distribution indicated the land:man ratiofor the poorest households to be 0.31 hectares. The Staff Appraisal ReporLfor Ekiti-Akoko estimated average farm size to be about 2.5 hectares, whileFaborode's estimate of average arable farm size in Ondo state was between0.24 to 0.4 hectares (Faborode op cit). In both areas, just as in WestJava, a large proportion of households, had access to to limited productivefarmlands.

4.27. Unequal access to land, and small size of holdings for a majorityof households have led some authors to conclude that the benefits of publicinvestments in agricultural infrastructure have not spread equitably acrossthe rural population. In the Gombe area, the growth of extensive farmingis reported to have been mainly financed and organized by the affluentelite (Beckman 1987). In other parts of Nigeria too, the vigorousexpansion of food crops near urban areas have often been attributed to theentrepreneurial initiatives of public servants, traders and largelandowners. Berry (1987) and Ross (1987) have expressed their concern thatthe Land Use Decree of 1978 is simply being used by the elite toappropriate valuable peri-urban lands for commercial agriculture with thehelp of State power. The Kaduna Land investigation for example, revealedthat land accumulation by the affluent had taken place by manipulating theDecree (Watts 1987).

4.28. The issue of policy concern is whether these actions by affluentmembers of the community are sustainable in the long run, or whether theymerely represent a short-term rent seeking strategy. If the new breed offarmers who lease in land with the backing of State power are not confidentof retaining their access rights, fragile topsoils could be mined forshort-term profits. The long term consequences could be the neglect long-gestation soil conservation measures essential to maintain fertility infarms where annual crops are being grown. In the peripheral areassurrounding urban settlements of Ekiti-Akoko, where extensive clearing oftree cover has occurred, such a trend could lead to serious problems ofsoil erosion. The question whether the social groups with traditionalrights of usage have willingly participated in thc leasing in and leasingout of lands becomes critical in evaluating the sustainability of food cropproduction in these identified microregions.

4.29. Without further empirical support one can only speculate on theobserved pattern of land use changes in rural areas. Further research isrequired to identify which of two opposite trends are dominating:

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* First, because of market integration and attractive prices beingobtained by food crops, the expansion of food crop farming in boththe urban peripheries (Ekiti-Akoko), and in the heavy clay soils(Gombe) could be improving employment and income-earning prospectsfor the poor. Profits could be plowed back for more intensiveand sustainable farming (as practiced in Kano) with minimum landdegradation.

* Second, because a (short term) rent-maximizing elite have utilizedaccess privileges to farm these areas, serious environmental risks(soil erosion in Ekiti-Akoko) or sustained public commitments ofresources (in maintaining road networks and fertilizers subsidiesin Gombe) impose escalating liabilities on the exchequer, withoutimproving farm productivity or increasing off-farm incomeopportunities.

4.30. The role of the poor in natural resource use would depend on whichof these two trends dominate. If the first dominates, poor individualshave one more alternative, as in West Java, (apart from the choice ofrural-urban migration) to subsistence farming in their villages. However,if the second dominates, growing populations of the poor will havevirtually no alternative to subsistence farming. The poor and the rentseeking elite would together irreversibly damage their fragile naturalresource base. LANDSAT images have helped identify the regions in bothGombe and Ekiti-Akoko requiring close monitoring to determine which ofthese two trends dominate. In areas where resource degradation is takingplace, policies and plans to comprehensively manage the natural resourcebase are necessary.

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V. CONCLUDING REMARKS

5.1. Natural resources data on soils, topography, vegetation, wateretc. have been often utilized to assess the economic potentials of landareas. This study has demonstrated that from a policy perspective, it isequally important to understand how macro-economic variables and povertydetermine land and water resources usages by communities. Land use changesover two points of time were identified, and then causality traced back torelevant economic factors. Specific investments by both the public andprivate sector, institutional factors, prevailing living and workingconditions - all, to varying degrees - contributed to observed changes innatural resource use in the study areas.

5.2. In both West Java and Nigeria, major observable changes in thephysical system since the 1970s such as, conversion of tree crop farms tofood crop farms, clearing the bush for farming, disappearance of forestreserves and the expansion of human settlements, could be traced back tostimuli from economic incentives, rather than to just poverty-inducedexactions. The economic stimuli have been influenced by several factors:the structure of product and factor markets, policies that encouragedprivate investments in agriculture, and the size and direction of publicinvestments.

5.3. In rural areas the direct link between poverty and environmentaldegradation was difficult to establish, although in densely populated areasof West Java, the growth of substandard squatter settlements, land andwater pollution, were clearly identifiable indirect links between povertyand the physical environment. In Nigeria, the direct links between povertyand resource degradation requires further ground-level research.

5.4. A study of three distinct agro-ecological regions from Indonesiaand Nigeria suggests that:

* It was possible in both countries, to relate changes in spatialareas of land and water use to specific economic decisions takenby individuals and the State. Public policies and institutionsappear to have played critical roles in setting the parameters ofnatural resource use by changing the incentive structures for thepoor and the r.on-poor alike.

* In all three study areas there was no evidence of widespreadvegetative clearings on relatively poor soils. Land use changeswere apparent in localized urban peripheries, and withinaccessible reserve forests in Nigeria. In Sukabumi (West Java),analogous changes were observed in abandoned estates, and in alllowlying reserve forests. On farmlands with steep slopes, agro-forestry, rather than dryland farming appeared to be the preferredincome earning strategy in Sukabumi. Overall, changes in land useappear to be rational responses to changing economicopportunities. The Nigerian data, however, requires furtherfield-level study to verify whether commercial farming in theurban peripheries are environmentally sustainable.

* 29 -

* Infrastructural investments, notably road construction, haveplayed major roles in changing natural resource use. Roads haveincreased areas under commercial agriculture, enabledentrepreneurs to illegally fell wood from reserve forest lands,and generally increased the mobility of capital and labor.

* Despite the widely differing economic and social conditions inNigeria and Indonesia, in both countries, the major 'software' orsocial infrastructural achievement has been the spread ofliteracy. The performance of other poverty-alleviatinginterventions, such as health care, safe drinking water, credithave not been as satisfactory. The spatial bias of publicinvestments towards urban areas has been more pronounced inNigeria.

* In both countries, the informal sector, rather than marginalfarmlands around villages has become the preferred "open accessresource" for the poor, and for many of the educated unemployed.

* In West Java the growth of circular migration, and spread of non-farm activities have been significant, reflecting greater spatialand occupational mobility of the poor. Despite no observableimprovements in income and wealth distribution, poverty in WestJava has been alleviated by economic growth and spatialintegration of rural areas. Poverty has, however, aggravatedenvironmental problems indirectly in the form of unsatisfactoryhygiene (congestion, pollution etc).

* The spatial dynamics of poverty has been strongly influenced bythe distance of rural communities from cities, availability oftransport links, and the growth of production and consumptionlinkages. In areas of high population density like Sukabumi (WestJava), the entire rural hinterland appears to have achievedspatial integration, creating large markets for commodities andlabor. In the Nigerian case studies, spatial integration appearsto be confined to a five to ten kilometer radius around majortowns (areas of high population densities). Land clearing wasalso observable along major road networks, even in areas of lowpopulation density. Vegetative cover changes in physicallyisolated areas were not observable in either Gombe or Ekiti-Akoko.

* In both countries, the growth of population has been mainlyconfined to existing settlements. In Gombe this feature isnoticeable despite the large areal expansion of farming onto theheavy clay soils of river valleys.

Validity of the Study for Research and Qterational Use:

5.5. For many developing countries, natural resource endowments are themost significant component of national wealth. Unless usage of theseendowments are carefully monitored, there is a danger that poorly designedpolicies, rapidly increasing populations and poverty could irretrievably

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damage their capital stock. As all physical investments ultimately have aspatial destination, one could, in theory, utilize spatially referencedsocio-economic and demographic data sets to:

(1) Explain why a certain pattern of change in natural resource stockis occurring,

(ii) Identify where unsustainable use of natural stock is likely to betaking place.

Consequently,

(iii) Given the financial constraints, identify areas that are bettersuited for agricultural and other economic activities,

(iv) Evaluate the costs and benefits of re-structuring economicactivities identified by (iii) above.

5.6. In a typical developing country, however, the practical problemsof implementing a research agenda discussed above appear formidable. Dataon both socio-economic and natural resource variables are usuallyunavailable at sufficient detailed level (cadastral information or evenindividual settlements). Collecting these data sets are also unaffordablebecause of competing demands for limited budgetary resources. What thisdesk study tried to show was that despite these practical problems,existing sources of data could be combined for a more aggregative,regional-level analysis of natural resource use-poverty-public policylinkages. These studies provide policy makers techniques that are usefulin both project and sector work. As and when data sets improve in quality,the analysis would generate more precise information that could serve theneeds of infrastructural planners as well.

5.7. In conclusion, many macro-economic policy instruments, such asinvestments in infrastructure, taxes and subsidies result in stock changesof physical capital in identifiable areas. Once the impacts of economicpolicy instruments are translated from conventional monetary aggregates tospatial 'stocks' or areal densities (see Beckmann and Puu 1985), it ispossible to combine them with demographic data, and study their linkageswith natural resource use. By reducing all relevant data sets to spatialstatistics, one can integrate economic and natural resource analysistechniques so that future policies and investments remain in harmony withsustainable development objectives.

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