E N V I RONMEN DEPA R T M E N T - - - Z 2 ~~D I S S-E Ml I N A T I:O N- N-O T E-S,:- w TOWARD I JI:l..I' 1:0IfJY AND SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Number 12 . | May, 1995 THE DOWNWARD SPI:RAL IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA: POPULATION GROWTH, AGRICULTURAL DECLINE, AND DESTRUCTION OF.THE ENVIRONMENT In Sub-Saharan Africa, problerms of agricultural demand for fewer children -- hardly surprising in view development, population growth, and the environment of the region's high infant and child mortality rates, and .are linked in a nexus of mutually reinforcing causality' a massive migration of men from the countryside to the. - chains. Indeed so negative are the connections between towns in search of jobs in recent years. As a result,' the three problems that-they have led to a' downward women are.iobliged to do more farm work -cultivat- spiral. . - - ' ing and producing food cro ps, harvesting and weeding, Consider agriculture. In the past, farming in Sub- and gathering fuelwood and water-in addition to tra- Saharan Africa was mainly pastoral and nomadic, and ditional household tasks. Small wonder most women allowed the land to lie fallow for long periods of time. want more children to spread the work around. To make When the population was small and stable,.it was well . matters worse, girls are often kept out of school so that suited to. survival, despite the fragile resources of the, they can assist in domestic chor&s; they, in turn, tend to region. . have limited horizons and are unable to make informed However, since the mid-1960's, the balance be- decisions about family planning. tween the numbers of inhabitants and food prodluction ' Insecurity over land tenure adds to the vicious has-collapsed in many parts of Sub-Saharan Africa. New circle. When populations grew- slowly and remained land opened for cultivation is increasingly only margin- small, traditional system:s of communal land ownership ally productive. Making matters worse, product.ivity in worked well and could accommodate t-he emerging de- pasture. and range areas has declined as a. result .of soil mand for more permanent land rights. However, in many erosion. A lack of infrastructure, especially of roads and countries in the region, old land tenure systems have transport in rural areas, and inappropriate price and not been able to adjust rapidly enough, and many gov- exchange'rate policies have contributed to the lack of .ernments' efforts to remedy the situation by nationaliz- agricultural -development. Furthermorie, the. 'small - ing.land have.further weakened tenurial security..' amoumit of existing agricultural technology has often, The signs of the crisis are now palpable. Per capita been. employed in'aii'environmentally destructive way,' food production hasdeclined.in inany countries in the for instance in intensive single crop production. For- region. Per capita-caloric consumption has stagnated at -ests have been thinned too, because of an almost exclu--. very low levels., Roughly 100 million people in Sub- sive dependency on wood for fuel and building pur- Saharan Africa are unsure about food supplies from year poses, and a lack of:regulations controlling cornmercial to year. Meanwhile, Sub-Saharan Africa's forests, which logging. This deforestation has aggravated soil erosion once extended over 679 mnillion hectares in 1980, have and degradation, and damaged wateisheds, leading to been decreasing at a rate of 3;7 million hectares a year a loss of native 'animal and plant species, as well as afnd as much as half of the region's. farmland, and 80 biodiversity richness. . - ' - ' percent of its pasture and rangeland, is now affected by A continued high birth rate has further exacerbated. erosion. the pressure on natural resources. Since 1965, the num- ber of childrei per woman living in Sub Saharan Africa The Way Out has remained at about 6.5, while it declined to 4 in the Despite the' gravity of the crisis, there are solu: 'developing world as a whole. The reasons forfhie per-. tions: To improve the region's^standard of living and sistently high birth rate in Sub Sahiaran Africa are.not 'to stop the downward spiral, two targets need to be hard to find. The most fundamental is a continual low realized: (1) raising agricultural'output by 4 percent a Dissemination Notes are produced by and available from the Environment Printed on 100% post-consumer recycled-paper D)epartment of the World Bank, Washington, D.C. 20433, FAX (202),477-0565 Year during 1990-2020 and with it the daily per capita caloric intake of the From Slash-and-Burn to Sustainable Farming region's inhabitants, from 2,027 'at Results of ICRAF field tests,of'environmentally benign, low-input present to .2,400 by the year 2010;arid Vsustainable technologies for.tropical forest areas suggest that farm- (2) reducing population growth from ing on newly cleared land must begin with low-input cropping. The its current'3. 1 percent-annu'al rate to a* 0 -initial slashing and burning clears.the land, adds nutrients to the soil, target rate of 2.3 percent.by the third arid reduices soil acidity for the first year of cultivation (tropical for- decade-of the next-century.'To obtain - est soils generally being very acidic), Acid-tolerant crops such as liower population growth rate, the to- upland rice and cowpeas should then be planted. First-year yields are tal fertility rate -that is, the total numi-:' usually very high. All crop residues (cowpea tops and rice-straw) b should be returned to the soil to improve its organic content. The plot should then be sown to pasture legumes or grasses. This "managed lifetime-would need to decline in $0 fallow" is more effective than.the traditional forest fallow in restoring Sub Saharan Africa by 5Q pret b3e- sierit tween nowaand thica byea 2020. HW c e-soil fertility. In subsequent years, more intensive methods are needed to maintain soil fertility. This may involve agroforestry, tree crops,' can these targets be achieved?. .legume-based pasture, or, if the farmer can afford it, the use of chemical Central to all attempts to reduce fertilizers (Sanchez 1991). population fertility rates is the need to Create -a demand for fewer children. Education can raise awareness among both men and women of the benefits of having smaller intensified (by about a 3.5 percent / year per unit of 'famnilies. .W6men's work loads need to be eased to re- land farmed), the constraining impact of expanding con-. duce the necessity for child labor. And training must be, servation areas on crop land can be offset, and conser- targeted at women-to ease their time constraints and vation and agricultural growth will be fully consistent. improve their productivity. , ' In these areas, mnuch may be learned from the work In the final analysis, successful agricultural inten- of local and intermational non-govermental organiza- sification and greatly reduced population fertility rates tions (NGOs), for instance, in establishing rural water are the critical elements for preventing further degra- supply systems managed by women's-groups; or in de- dation .of the rural environmenit. Effectivedemand for veloping fuel-efficient and time-efficient wood and char- family planning -services and for environmentally be- coal stoves; or in providing improved, and environmen- nign agricultural technologies (many of which'already tally benign, farmning and harvesting tools- or facilitat- exist and can be developed from the region's traditional ing women's access to credit; or providing rural infra- farm practices), such as.animal-drawn farrn implements,:0 structure, like roads, sanitation, health, and education need to be promoted. -But doing this means moving away services, and locally'appropriate means of transport. from-a narrow, conventional, sectoral approach-to the Having equal rights to ownl-and andthe same ten- region's problems, to crioss-sectoral analvses and ac- ure security as men will also improve women's sense tion programs, addressing the'links between the differ-' - of land tenure- security. Clarifying -such land rights is ent-sectors. particularly urgent in view of theincreasing number of female-headed households in-rural areas., Meanwhile, in agriculture, efforts are needed to Reference: Sanchez, PedroA. 1991. "AlteratiVes to Slash andBurn: . . A . - - .- 0: Pragmatic Approach to Miigate Tropical'Deforestation` (mimeo.y. simultaneously intensify and increase production, and, Paper presented at the World Bank Conference on. "Agricultural at the same time, to preserve forests and other natural- Technology for Sustainable Economic Development in the New Cen- resources. Raising farm output canlbe done by irnprov- . tury: Policy Issues for the Intemational Community?" Washington,: - :- .-" .~"~'- of crop d se.d. - D.C. 23 October 1991. Africa Technical Department.World Bank. ing the varieties of crop and sed,: increasing fertilizer Wsigo lug LI1~ vaii~~i~aan Increasing - -Washington, D.C. use, and by mechanizing where necessary. However, to ::__________________:'-\:..-______________,- conserve natural resources and biodiversity, it is essen- This note was adaptedffrom "Reversing the Spiral: The Population, tial to create parks,-nature reserves, and community- Agriculture and Environmen't Nexus in Sub-Saharan Africa," by owned range-land, and to prevent these areas being con - Kevin Cleaver and Gotz Schreiber, Direc:ions in Development Se- . ' , -. e .- ries. Washington; D.C.: World Bank, 1994. Dissemination Notes rep- verted into cropland. It is also vital to protect forests If r the views of their authors and should not be attrbuted to the pro ~~~~resenutn ldrot " agricultural production can be adequately increased and World Bank..