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Judy Oglethorpe, MS, Conservation Innovation, World Wildlife Fund, 1250 24th NW, Washington, DC 20037, 202-293-4800, oglethor@wwfus.org
Health, livelihoods and environment linkages in many rural areas in the developing world are strongly affected not only by population growth due to high fertility, but also by HIV/AIDS.
The HIV/AIDS epidemic is having devastating impacts on rural livelihoods in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. These underserved communities often have inadequate or no outside support in HIV/AIDS awareness, prevention and treatment. When households lose salary earners and capacity for heavy agriculture they often turn to natural resources as a final safety net for food and income. Activities such as hunting, fishing and charcoal making often increase. Harvesting of medicinal plants increases to treat side-effects of AIDS. All this can seriously erode the resource base of communities’ long-term livelihoods. Indigenous knowledge of sound land and resource use practices is sometimes lost. Community capacity for conservation programs is eroded, at the same time that conservation organizations are losing capacity to AIDS. Many conservation organizations that work with underserved communities are looking at ways of mainstreaming HIV/AIDS and developing strategies to help mitigate the impacts on livelihoods and environment. Strategies often involve a multi-sectoral collaboration with the health and other sectors. They include enhancing HIV/AIDS awareness, prevention and treatment, which can often be delivered in parallel with family planning services. Other activities include developing alternatives to unsustainable practices; and promoting sustainable natural resource-based micro-enterprises that are non labor-intensive.
Learning Objectives: Participants attending this session will be able to
Keywords: HIV/AIDS, Environment
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.