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DEFORESTATION, ENVIRONMENTAL INSECURITY, POVERTY AND CONFLICT IN THE HORN OF AFRICA AND GREAT LAKES

By Mersie Ejigu

There is an emerging consensus that environmental security is a useful concept for understanding armed conflict in Africa and elsewhere. A society becomes insecure in an environmental sense when severe deforestation and biodiversity loss threaten national, community and individual welfare and survival.

Whilst the correlation between environmental insecurity and armed conflict has become widely accepted, scholars caution that the link between environment and conflict is never direct. A wide range of factors including governance, socio-economic variables, culture, level of technology and property rights influence how the environment affects conflict.

To contribute to the understanding of these links and their implications for policy development and peace building, the Partnership for African Environmental Sustainability (PAES) launched a study of Burundi, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Uganda funded by the European Union.

Study approach
This four-country study pursued a multidisciplinary and multilevel approach to understanding the role of environmental insecurity in causing and amplifying armed conflict. Household surveys and community focused group discussions were organised to capture communities’ perceptions.

Burundi, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Uganda share important processes common to all. Degradation of natural resources, particularly renewable resources, is widespread as evident from loss of forest, soil and water resources. These resources are increasingly scarce because of diminished supplies, increased population-induced demands, and inequality in distribution. The economic returns to these resources are low and falling as evident from diminishing productivity, declining livelihood and impoverishment. Population mobility in response to scarcity and impoverishment is common. Policy, institutional and technological deficiencies are also prevalent.

Findings of the study
In all the four countries, the study established that:

1. There is strong evidence of environmental insecurity that manifested itself in the form of: small and declining farm size; greater incidence of land fragmentation; increased cultivation intensity; growing landlessness; grazing land is in short supply, emerging tenure arrangements with rising informal land transactions.
2. There is also strong evidence from the case countries that environment and poverty are closely linked. First, the majority of the population is dependent on natural resources for their livelihoods, particularly on agriculture. Second, the natural resource base is shrinking (i.e.,forest cover, grazing land, arable agricultural land, and water resources). Third, incidence of poverty tends to be greater in ecologically fragile marginal agricultural areas with few routes to escape poverty.
3. Households have developed multiple coping strategies, which they typically fully exhaust before they decide to migrate. These include: sell small livestock; sell large animals; casual wage; reducing food consumption; relief dependency; and migration. In all cases, migration is a coping strategy of the last resort.
4. There are several types of environmentinduced conflicts:
   1. Cultivator-Cultivator Conflicts. These are associated with pressure on farmland and commonly owned resources (grazing land, community forests and water points). Reported cases of disputes over agricultural land were over inter-generational transfer, division of common pool resources, settlement of non-indigenous population, and claims to original land by returnee migrants constitute the primary were reported
   2. Herder-Cultivator Conflicts. Conflicts between pastoralists and cultivators over access to pasture and water resources are common in the “cattle corridor” of Uganda, which extends from southwest to Karamoja in northeast including Mabrara, Rakai and Katakwi districts. The historical and contemporary conflicts between agriculturalist Hutus and pastoral Tutsis in Rwanda and Burundi are classic examples of cultivator-herder conflict, too. Tutsi is not exactly the name of an ethnic group.
   3. Herder-Herder Conflicts. There are numerous cases of conflicts between different pastoralist societies who live next to each other. The most significant conflicts in Ethiopia occur in the Awash River basin, which cuts across different ethnic groups. Each and every herder community experiences conflicts over access to resources, especially to grazing land and water.
   4. State-Cultivator/Herder Conflicts. Conflicts between state and farmers including both cultivators and herders are pervasive in the study countries. In Uganda, conflicts arise from encroachment of government controlled protected areas. For example, there was a mass eviction of Bakiga who had settled in Mpokya/Kibale Forest areas in 1993, in Mt. Elgon National Park in 2000, and in other protected areas, including Mgahinga, Mt. Rwenziri, and Queen Elizabeth National Parks. The Karamojong are against the gazetting of most of their fertile land and, in response, they encroach on pasture and water in Teso and Lango. In Ethiopia, statecultivator and state herder conflicts existed since the 1960’s. Prior to the 1975 Land Reform, such conflicts were triggered by Government’s decision to individualize the commons. In the post Land Reform years, state-cultivator conflicts became more prevalent reform that prohibited land transfer other than through the state functionaries. Land is state owned and qualified farmers have access through local state functionaries. Hence conflicts arise between these functionaries and farmers over access, use and transfer of government owned land.

Conclusion
The study confirms the widely held view that environmental insecurity plays a significant role in causing, triggering and aggravating armed conflicts. The likelihood of conflict increases where environmental insecurity induces migration, in particular for heterogeneous communities (e.g., ethnic, culture, etc.). Where migrants dominate economic and political spheres, recipient communities become aggravated and the propensity to conflict mounts. Conflicts are almost certain to arise where a weak state fails to deliver law and order, provide transparent and accountable administration, implement unbiased and fair policy, or effective mechanisms to address and resolve grievances and disputes. On the other hand, nurturing of social ties, sound natural resource use and economic integration neutralize forces that tend towards armed conflict.

The study further concluded that conflict prevention and resolution could result in lasting peace if anchored in combating environmental degradation, forest recovery, sound tenure policy and sustainable land management practices.

Mersie Ejigu
President and Chief Executive Officer
Partnership for African Environmental Sustainability (PAES)
Plot 3157 Tankhill Road Muyenga
P. O. Box 10273, Kampala
Uganda

E-mail: mejigu@paes.org
Website: http://www.paes.org

Reference
Mersie Ejigu, Environmental security and conflict: the quest for sustainable peace and development in Africa. A summary of the main report of the PAES four-country study: findings, conclusions and recommendations. June 2004

Partnership for African Environmental Sustainability (PAES) is a non-governmental organisation established by a group of experienced and concerned Africans to promote environmentally and socially sustainable development in Africa based on best practices. Headquartered in Kampala, Uganda, PAES has offices in Washington, DC and Lusaka, Zambia.

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