As we’ve noted before, there is a strong relationship between environmental crises and social instability. Similarly, developing world communities with healthy environments and sound practices (from farming sustainably to building greenbelts) often see faster gains in alleviating poverty. This connection between sustainability and social well-being is so pervasive, it applies even to refugees. So it should perhaps come as no surprise that two major recent studies have strengthened our understanding of that connection. The first is a report by WRI, Nature’s Benefits in Kenya: An Atlas of Ecosystems and Human Well-Being, which aims to use mapping tools and available data to show the links between ecosystem services and poverty: Through a series of maps and analyses, the authors focus on the environmental resources most Kenyans rely on such as soil, water, forest, rangeland, livestock, and wildlife. The atlas overlays georeferenced statistical information on population and household expenditures with spatial data on ecosystems and their services (water availability, wood supply, wildlife populations, and the like) to yield a picture of how land, people, and prosperity are related in Kenya. The report itself is exhaustive, but even reading through the journalist’s guide gave me several flashes of new insight into how people… (more)
(Posted by Alex Steffen in Climate Change at 10:31 AM)