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Looking back to leap forward: does environment and development economics matter to South Asia's future?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2014

Priya Shyamsundar
Priya Shyamsundar*
Affiliation:
South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics (SANDEE), P.O. Box 8975 EPC 1056, Lalitpur, Nepal. Email: [email protected]
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Extract

I was 23 when I first ventured into rural India as a research assistant to examine how women harvested, traded and earned income from a fruit from the Uppage (Garcinia Cambogia) tree. The seeds were collected for their oil by local women, until markets opened up for the fruit, which had value as a condiment in a neighboring region. This led to changes in demand, and harvest rights began to be auctioned by the government. The Uppage case presents a classic story of access to new markets leading to partial privatization of common property, with consequences for both conservation and income distribution. Of course, I knew little about environmental economics then. But this foray into rural India exposed me to many elements of environment and development problems – the challenges of managing the commons, the possibility of markets leading to overexploitation of resources and growth in employment, the idea of institutional change contributing to multiple winners and losers with poor women being left behind on the bottom rung, and so on. This had a life-changing influence, leading me eventually to branch out and specialize in this area.

Type
Forum
Information
Environment and Development Economics , Volume 19 , Issue 3: Special Issue of Environment and Development Economics: Looking Back and Moving Forward , June 2014 , pp. 320 - 322
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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References

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