Human perceptions of environmental degradation in a part of the Kalahari ecosystem

✍ Scribed by Raban Chanda

• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1996
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 620 KB
• Volume: 39
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0343-2521
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00174930

✦ Synopsis

This paper is based on data on human perceptions of environmental degradation generated using the rapid rural appraisal approach in a part of Botswana's Kalahari environment. The data revealed a high level of respondent awareness of local resource use problems related to negative environmental change. However, respondent perceptions of the causes of, and solutions to, to environmental degradation were found to be mainly outward oriented; the possibility of local human contribution to the problem and its solution was widely down-played. The data point to the need for measures to bring about "correct" perceptions so that people can see where their own activities fit in the causal nexus of environmental degradation and acknowledge their power to contribute to solutions thereof.