All related to Natural Resources

Sanjay Barbora, 2006

PhD Thesis, North Eastern Hill University, India

For further information please contact the author

Christine Bichsel, Gilbert Fokou, Asel Ibraimova, Ulan Kasymov, Bernd Steimann, Susan Thieme, 2009

The article focuses on continuity and change in natural resource institutions in post-Soviet Kyrgyzstan. Two main trends have characterised the management of water, agricultural land and pastures since the country became independent in 1991. First, while natural resources were collective and state-owned during the Soviet period, they are now being gradually privatised and passed into individual or group ownership. Second, by contrast with central administration under the Soviet regime, after independence natural resource management has been and is increasingly being decentralised to the community level. We suggest that these processes have created a new concept of the ‘private’, defined as clearly assigned property rights as opposed to ‘commons’, and individual or group ownership as opposed to ‘public’ ownership. We attempt here to analyse how privatisation and decentralisation have created new property relations and new forms of natural resource governance.

In: Hurni H, Wiesmann U, editors; with an international group of co-editors. Global Change and Sustainable Development: A Synthesis Regional Experiences from Research Partnerships. Perspectives of the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) North-South, University of Bern, Vol. 5. Bern, Switzerland: Geographica Bernensia, pp 255-269.

Download

The tragedy and glory of the 'private'

Christine Bichsel, Gilbert Fokou, Asel Ibraimova, Ulan Kasymov, Bernd Steimann, Susan Thieme, 2008

Poster presented at the ICRD, International Conference on Research for Development. 2.-4.7.2008, Berne, Switzerland.

Download

Bassirou Bonfoh, Jerome Chenal, Gilbert Fokou, Mathieu Gasparini, Henri-Michel Yéré, 2008

Poster presented at the International Conference on Research for Development (ICRD). 2-4 July 2008, Berne, Switzerland.

Download

Gilbert Fokou, Bassirou Bonfoh, Jerome Chenal, Mathieu Gasparini, Henri-Michel Yéré, 2010

Focusing on pastoralism and access to land, this article aims to demonstrate that management institutions are eroded in a context of resource scarcity, and that certain groups build discourse and strategies on fuzzy notions of nationhood or identity in order to exclude other users. In this process, the notion of autochthony appears to be an ideological tool in the hands of native people to express their social malaise and difficulties in sustaining their livelihoods in a context of global development. The article concludes that in a context of ‘presence-absence’ of the state, negotiations between various stakeholders at different levels could foster sustainable development.

In: Hurni H, Wiesmann U, editors; with an international group of co-editors. Global Change and Sustainable Development: A Synthesis of Regional Experiences from Research Partnerships. Perspectives of the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) North-South, University of Bern, Vol. 5. Bern, Switzerland: Geographica Bernensia, pp 61-76.

Download

Participatory Conservation in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe

Marc Galvin, Tobias Haller, 2008

"This is an important contribution to the literature on protected areas and the political ecology of natural resource management and conservation. It provides a very timely analysis of "participatory" PA governance and management, examining "new paradigm" PA approaches which - in policy and rhetoric if not always in practice - offer alternatives to the fortress conservation approaches that have so often proved environmentally ineffective, socially disastrous and morally questionable. The editors and 31 contributors "tried to determine how the participatory approach to conservation evolved in specific settings and who profits from the new approach." Drawing on research by 13 research groups working in diverse regions of the global South (South America, sub-Saharan Africa, and South and Southeast Asia) and in Switzerland, the book offers a set of coordinated case studies that are attentive to historical, geographical, political, social, and economic contexts and dynamics." Stan Stevens, Univ. of Massachusetts

Download Book (8 MB)
Download Flyer (0.3 MB)

A Garayeva, Daniel Maselli, 2008

M. W. Jenkins , L. W. Chiuri, Francis K. Lelo, S. N. Miller, W. A. Shivoga, 2009

Download

Boniface Kiteme, 2006

PhD Thesis, University of Bern, Switzerland

For further information please contact the author

Report from the ALS-Workshop commissioned to CAMP, Bielagorka, 2-5 August 2004.

Aina Oskonbaevna Mamytova, Tashtan Kochkunbaev, 2004

Description of a seminar including purposes, tasks, programme, methodology, and training processes of the seminar. In a second part results and conclusions from each 'day sessions' are presented.

Report from the ALS-Workshop commissioned to CAMP, Bielagorka, 2-5 August 2004.

Download

Simon Mason, A. Müller, 2007

In: Steininger K, Cogoy M, editors. The Economics Of Global Environmental Change: International Cooperation for Sustainability. Edward Elgar.

Order from: Edward Elgar

Gimbage Ernest Mbeyale, N. A. Songorwa, 2008

The Mkomazi Game Reserve (MGR) in north-eastern Tanzania is a protected area where different social groups are involved in contest for natural resources. Using MGR as a case study, we examine and discuss how the fortress approach to conservation has led to management problems. We present an overview of conflicts between the MGR authorities and communities, analyse strategies used to deal with the situation and discuss the different ideologies involved.
On one hand this is a successful story of fortress conservation. There is proof of increasing bird numbers and improvement in vegetation cover. However, this is at the expense of livelihood security of the local population. We recommend alternative conservation pathways that adopt new participatory conservation approaches instead of the fortress approach currently implemented in MGR.

In: Galvin M, Haller T, editors. People, Protected Areas and Global Change: Participatory Conservation in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe. Perspectives of the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) North-South, University of Bern, Vol. 3. Bern: Geographica Bernensia, pp. 221-251.

Download

T. Philemon, 2006

MSc Thesis

Stephan Rist, Mani Chidambaranathan, Cesar Escobar, Urs Wiesmann, 2006

Sustainable natural resource use requires that multiple actors reassess their situation in a systemic perspective. This can be conceptualised as a social learning process between actors from rural communities and the experts from outside organisations. A specifically designed workshop provided the background for evaluating the potentials and constraints of intensified social learning processes. Case studies in rural communities in India, Bolivia, Peru and Mali showed that changes in the narratives of the participants of the workshop followed a similar temporal sequence relatively independently from their specific contexts. Social learning processes were found to be more likely to be successful if they 1) opened new space for communicative action, allowing for an intersubjective re-definition of the present situation, 2) contributed to rebalance the relationships between social capital and social, emotional and cognitive competencies within and between local and external actors.

Journal of Systemic Practice and Action Research 19(3):219-237.

Download from: SpringerLink

Stephan Rist, Farid Dahdouh-Guebas, 2006

Integration of indigenous knowledge and ethnoscientific approaches into contemporary frameworks for conservation and sustainable management of natural resources will become increasingly important in policies on an international and national level. We set the scene on how this can be done by exploring the key conditions and dimensions of a dialogue between ‘ontologies’ and the roles, which ethnosciences could play in this process. First, the roles which ethnosciences in the context of sustainable development were analysed, placing emphasis on the implications arising when western sciences aspire to relate to indigenous forms of knowledge. Secondly, the contributions of ethnosciences to such an ‘inter-ontological dialogue’ were explored, based on an ethnoecological study of the encounter of sciences and indigenous knowledge in the Andes of Bolivia, and reviewed experiences from mangrove systems in Kenya, India and Sri Lanka, and from case-studies in other ecosystems world-wide.

Environment, Development and Sustainability 8(4):467-493.

From the Princely State of Swat and Kalam to the State of Pakistan

Sultan-i- Rome, 2008

The historic Swat valley in the North-West Frontier-Province (NWFP) of Pakistan and its adjoining area were covered in forest since the earliest times. The nineteenth century proved a turning point in respect to the exploitation of these forests when some outsiders, mostly Kaka Khel Mians, started to exploit the forest in the area and extracted timber for export.
Research into the present-day forest issues in NWFP has always recognised the importance of the historical past. However, very little was known about the details of forestry in the areas that comprised the princely state of Swat, and Kalam - both before and during the period of the Princely State of Swat.
The objective of the present study is to cover in detail the Walis period from 1947 till 1969 and also the post-State period; and to show how forests have been managed and used in the Swat State areas and Kalam during the period 1947-2005.

WP2/IP6 Working Paper No. 9.

Zurich: Department of Geography, University of Zurich

Monika Schaffner, Ruth Scheidegger, Irene Wittmer, 2007

"Increasingly intensive farming practices have led to a dramatic deterioration of water quality in the Tha Chin River in Thailand. One major problem is the high level of nutrients. According to our model – based on material flow analysis – intensive aquaculture accounts for a large
proportion of the nutrient inputs."

Eawag News 62d: 18-20.

Download

A case study in the Thachin River, Central Thailand

Monika Schaffner, Hans-Peter Bader, Thammarat Koottatep, Ruth Scheidegger, Roland Schertenleib, 2006

"The Material Flow Analysis carried out for Tha Chin River Basin is illustrated by an in-depth study on nutrient contributions from aquaculture."

Download

The Sokuluk river basin (Tien Shan, Kyrgyzstan)

Jyldyz Shigaeva, Michael Kollmair, Daniel Maselli, Peter Niederer, 2006

The sudden independence of Kyrgyzstan from the Soviet Union in 1991 led to a total rupture of industrial and agricultural production. Based on empirical data, this study seeks to identify key land use transformation processes since the late 1980s, their impact on people’s livelihoods and the implication for natural resources in the communes of Tosh Bulak and Saz, located in the Sokoluk River Basin on the northern slope of the Kyrgyz Range.

In: Price M F, editor. Global Change in Mountain Regions. Sapiens, Duncow, Dumfriesshire, UK, pp. 227-228. Abstract.