Natural Resources And Sustainable Development

First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

There are more than 6 billion people living on Earth today, and the United Nations predicts that this number will surge to 9.1 billion by the year 2050. However, the natural resources necessary to sustain the world's population-including freshwater, arabl

Providing both a theoretical background and practical examples of natural resource conflict, this volume explores the pressures on natural resources leading to scarcity and conflict. It is shown that the causes and driving forces behind natural resource conflicts are diverse, complex and often interlinked, including global economic growth, exploding consumption, poor governance, poverty, unequal access to resources and power. The different interpretations of nature-culture and the role of humans in the ecosystem are often at the centre of the conflict. Natural resource conflicts range from armed conflicts to conflicts of interest between stakeholders in the North as well as in the South. The varying driving forces behind such disputes at different levels and scales are critically analysed, and approaches to facilitate and enforce mediation, transformation and collaboration at these levels and scales are presented and discussed. In order to transform existing resource conflicts, as well as to decrease the risk of future conflicts, approaches that enhance and enforce collaboration for sustainable development at global, regional, national and local levels are reviewed, and sustainable pathways suggested. A range of global examples is presented including water resources, fisheries, forests, human–wildlife conflicts, urban environments and the consequences of climate change. It will be a valuable text for advanced students of natural resource management, environment and development studies and peace and conflict management. The book will also be of interest to practitioners in the field of natural resource management.

Examining the law, regulation and governance of natural resources, this timely work addresses the conflicts and contradictions arising at the intersection between international economic law, sustainable development and other areas of international law, most notably human rights law and environmental law. Bringing together a collection of legal and policy expertise from a range of academic and practitioner perspectives, this book will appeal to scholars of law, political science, international relations, political economy and development studies.

The word 'sustainability' is frequently misunderstood because there are numerous definitions of sustainability and not even two definitions have converging meanings. Instead of achieving 'sustainability', some of the sustainable development projects aggravate ecological and other problems, as painfully evidenced in numerous experimental projects. This book attempts to improve our understanding of what it means to be sustainable by exploring several different sustainability projects and techniques.

Intended for aspiring and new practitioners of Participatory Research and Development (PR&D) as well as field-based researchers in developing countries. Highlights that agricultural research and development has become a joint approach to deal with diverse biophysical environments, multiple livelihood goals, rapid changes in local and global economies, and an expanded range for stakeholders over agriculture and natural resources.

This book contains the proceedings of the third in a now-biennial series organized by the Wessex Institute of Technology around the urgent need to determine solutions regarding sustainable development before our planet reaches a point of irreversibility. The aggressive search for new sources of energy and materials, the rapid rate at which natural resources are being consumed, and the destructiveness of the resulting pollution are all having a negative impact on the planet that needs to be stopped, if not reversed. As at the first two, participants at this conference will take stock of our situation and try to facilitate constructive principles and policies for a way forward, something that can only be done by transdisciplinary cooperation. Thus papers will examine ethical, political and social issues, health, safety and risk, lessons from nature, planning and development, and new technologies.