This paper analyses the preparatory process for the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), to see what it might suggest about the direction that the population debate has taken since the 1974 World Population Conference at Bucharest and its successor conference held at Mexico City in 1984. Given the insights obtained from the ICPD preparatory process, and the legacy of the preceding two UN population conferences, what can we say about the directions that the evolving population agenda may take at Cairo?

In an attempt to answer this question we make four predictions: (i) the linkage between population and development will be reaffirmed; (ii) United States' ‘Mexico City Policy’ will be formally reversed as the US will seek to recapture the leadership role in the field that it conceded in 1984; (iii) women's health issues will take centre-stage as a new focus in the ongoing debate on the larger ‘population question’ as the agenda is again realigned; and (iv) nations will once again refuse attempts by the population establishment to adopt quantitative population targets.

This paper presents a review of the basic concepts underlying the economic evaluation of forest conservation benefits, summarizes major documented case-studies in which attempts have been made to apply valuation methods to forest-conserving land-uses, and discusses the applicability of the methods used according to the different types of benefit.

Recently, intensification of both rain-fed and dry-season irrigated agriculture has necessitated widespread use of pesticides in the extensive sub-humid zones of Nigeria. In this region is located over 80% of Nigeria's existing surface area of reservoirs in the country. The majority of these reservoirs were built artificially for a multiplicity of uses among which fisheries and Nature conservation ranked very high.—

Calls for small-scale farmers to move away from the use of purchased inputs in order to make farming more environmentally sustainable are being increasingly voiced on the strength of ecological arguments. These arguments, backed up by technical information on natural resource-loss or degradation, and by descriptions of sustainable indigenous systems which use few external inputs, are often persuasive. However, they can also be simplistic and misleading.

NGOs have started to feature prominently in the political landscape of many industrialized as well as developing nations, and their roles in global environmental governance are being increasingly recognized by governmental policymakers. The 1993 gathering at the Earth Summit in Rio, where NGOs were accorded a seat at the negotiating tables alongside of government representatives, bears testimony to this fact. Besides involving themselves in environmental policy negotiations, however, NGOs have used other strategies and tactics to influence global environmental policy decision-making.

It is noted that the number of more or less permanently displaced persons throughout the world (now of the order of 1% of the total human population) continues to increase at a rate of approximately 3 millions per year; the situation in Africa is especially grave, with the number of displaced persons there (now of the order of 3% of the African population), continuing to increase at a rate of approximately 1.5 million per year. Human displacement — which can be seen to originate largely in rural areas — results primarily from one or more of three factors, namely escape from persecution, escape from military activities, or escape from inadequate means of subsistence. A number of examples from Africa are provided of the social and political consequences of human displacement, with emphasis on conflict situations at the sites of relocation.

It is further noted that the numbers of displaced persons continue to grow relentlessly despite there being no discernible rise in persecution or military activities, and despite the long-sustained ameliorative efforts and financial assistance by intergovernmental agencies and others.

It is accordingly suggested that the major cause of the continuing increase in the numbers of displaced persons is an ever-growing imbalance between population numbers and the human carrying capacity of the land. Population increases lead to smaller per caput natural resource bases, a predicament exacerbated by over-use — and thus degradation — of the land and its natural resources. In the arid and semi-arid regions of Africa, over-use of the land most often takes the form of overgrazing, leading to land degradation that is severe enough to be referred to as desertification. It is concluded that to achieve sustainable utilization of the land and its natural resources will necessitate the integrated attainment of environmental security and societal security — the latter inter alia requiring participatory governance, non-violent means of conflict resolution, and especially population controls.

Global urbanization is proceeding at an alarming rate and is threatening the long-term survival of many important biological resources. Planners in the City of Durban (South Africa), cognizant of this impending environmental crisis, have designed an urban open-space network aimed at preserving a representative and functional example of the previous indigenous landscapes now under threat as a result of development.

Biogeographical principles have been used to produce for Durban a system characterized by maximized reserve size, continuity, and overall minimized system linearity with the lowest edge-to-area ratio possible. Emphasis has also been placed on economic viability and on the importance of community acceptance and participation within the system.

The case of Western Samoa is used to challenge the tendency in the recent literature to polarize the issue of tropical deforestation as caused by either political economic forces or increasing human demands. While it is recognized that political economic forces must be changed in many cases to make just and sustainable use of the forest possible, the case of Western Samoa is used to highlight the difficult challenge of conserving tropical forests and their biodiversity even under customary land-tenure and local control of forest resources.

Owing to their sub-Sahelian climate, the Cape Verde Islands, lying off the coast of West Africa, experience severe problems of soil erosion and surface-water loss. Thus the development of this country has included widescale planting of trees, mainly Prosopis juliflora, and the building of contour walls and small dams. Agroforestry species are being tested for both erosion control and the production of wood and timber. The conservation of native crop species, and the use of integrated pestcontrol, have been given priority in Cape Verde's agricultural development.

In Madagascar, as practically throughout the world, many protected areas were originally created with little consideration for the resource requirements of local people and consequently are now suffering from acute pressure from local exploitation. In an attempt to redress the problems, integrated conservation and development projects have been initiated. The original aims to protect a representative ecocomplex are now expected to be achieved by understanding people's requirements and enhancing traditional practices or providing alternatives, and the aims have been expanded to promote the sustainable use of resources also outside of reserves.

These two projects, at Andohahela and Soalala, are duly considered, using a framework that has been developed to understand local people's behaviour in relation to resources. Economic, energy, cultural, and ecological, factors, acting as interdependent systems, are considered. The economic, energy, and cultural, factors influence each other, acting together to define the values or resources to people and driving their behaviour in relation to those resources. The behaviour affects the ecological system and may alter the availability of useful resources, depending on the level of use and their resilience. The availability of resources affects the energetic effort required to collect them, so establishing a feedback link.

The aims of the projects are to establish ecological equilibria that protect the reserves and enable sustainable use to be made of resources outside the reserve. To achieve these goals they must influence people's behaviour suitably. Strategies include strengthening feedback from the ecological system, and providing energy or economic incentives. Development activities which aim to promote sustainable use of resources and protect biodiversity, through maintenance of the protected area, are assessed. Many projects give a high priority to income generation and improved access to social services; however, the conservation aims of a project often require a better targeted, resource management-based development package. This paper advocates the consideration of economic, energy, ecological, and above all cultural, factors in the design of effective activities for conservation and development projects.

An examination of the behaviour of conservation area staff in northern Benin indicates that they are not working as effectively as they ought to be, owing to a series of interrelated physical and social conditions. This study suggests that a compensatory approach alone — improved housing, vehicles, equipment, and salaries — is unlikely to be sufficient to improve motivation, and may perversely reduce effectiveness.

Designing appropriate policies and strategies that lead to environmental conservation (of biological diversity and natural ecosystems) and ecologically sustainable development, is not an option but a necessity. Nevertheless, it requires an appropriate developmental paradigm that can provide a more relevant perceptual and interpretive framework from which such strategies may emerge. The prevailing dominant social paradigm has ignored the following problems: the present level of resource consumption in the developed industrialized countries, the acute poverty and inequitable development pattern in the Third World, the massive capital flight from ‘global’ South to ‘global’ North, and the massive population growth-rates in poor Third World countries, for political or ideological reasons. This paradigm will ultimately lead to environmental destruction and collapse of The Biosphere if ‘business’ continues ‘as usual’.

There has been unwillingness on the part of the politicians to admit this truth, but the development philosophy that does not include the strategies which can induce changes in our consumption and behavioural patterns, attitudes towards Nature, environmentally sound conservation and management practices and principles, elimination of poverty and inequity, and reduction of global population growth, will achieve nothing more than, as Morowitz (1991) calls it, a ‘Sisyphus's Myth’.

Only a development paradigm that is deeply rooted in the principle of cooperation, social synergism, equity, and the understanding of ecological and social sustainability of resource uses, allocation, and management, can offer hope and engender optimism. The sooner humanity realizes and acts on this, the greater will be the chance for environmental conservation and the lesser will be the cost of human adaptation.

Ski slopes are commonly established following clearcutting of areas of well-developed forests, scraping off the surface soil, and seeding the entire ground-surface, as forests widely remain in mountainous regions where skiing is developed in Japan. The ski slopes are then sown with seeds of exotic plants in an attempt to prevent soil erosion. However, many bare areas remain, or develop, on ski slopes. Due to this landscape fragmentation, not only deterioration of Nature but also environmental problems develop, including those of water, garbage, and traffic, pollution.

The ski-resort concentration occurs mainly in regions of high-quality landscape around urbanized areas, and derives mostly from economic benefits. Yet any regulation of ski-resort construction has unfortunately been delayed. Areas where ski-resorts have been concentrated have a high risk of damage, and further studies of the situation are overdue. We should reconsider the construction, enlargement, and distribution patterns, of skiresorts, and any further development should be based on sound ecological and conservational knowledge rather than mere transient economic considerations.

A buffer zone for RCNP is considered an effective means to mitigate and contain the Park–local people conflict. Its creation adjacent to the National Park will enable local people to engage in multiple-use activities that will provide benefits not only to themselves but protect the Park's integrity as well. Except for the much-degraded Barandabar Forest, the other small parcels of forest that exist around the Royal Chitwan National Park are highly inadequate to provide additional wildlife protection and environmental conservation. RCNP does not have any area that, to date, is exclusively designated as a buffer zone. The Barandabar Forest is still envisaged as an additional protection to the Park, although continual grazing, lopping of branches and twigs from trees, and timber extraction, by the local people, have extensively diminished its biological values.

An ecological survey of undisturbed saline wastelands and adjacent fields of Kallar Grass (Leptochloa fusca) was undertaken to study species distribution in relation to soil conditions and changes in species composition during amelioration processes. Five plant communities, represented by Atriplex crassifolia C.A. Mey., Cynodon dactylon (L.) Pers., Desmostachya bipinnata (L.) Stapf, Suaeda fruticosa (L.) Forssk., and Eleusine flagellifera Nees, had colonized undisturbed areas. Soils of plant communities dominated by these species showed significant variations in salinity and sodicity. S. fruticosa was dominant on highly saline–sodic soil, Cynodon on slightly saline and moderately sodic soil, whereas D. bipinnata showed little variation in cover percentage with changes in salinity and sodicity of soil. These three species had wide ecological amplitude compared with E. flagellifera and A. crassifolia, which were restricted to non-saline and marginally saline–sodic soils, respectively.

The ecological problems, including degradation of fragile ecosystems, of the Himalaya are quite conspicuous. A rapid depletion of forest resources is the main cause of environmental degradation and economic deterioration. Watersheds are considered as a unit for natural resource management and development in hilly areas; therefore a case-study of Mamlay watershed of Sikkim is presented in this paper.

The Mamley watershed presents a viable system having a gradient of altitude where almost all types of land-uses that are common in the eastern Himalaya are found. All the ethno-cultural groups of Sikkim are present in this watershed, although the agricultural sector provides the main land-use, followed by forestry. Most of the forested areas in the Himalaya have been purportedly destroyed for the expansion of agricultural land. A similar situation was experienced in the Mamlay watershed, where an increase of 12.79% of the land-area used for agriculture has been recorded in the past 40 years. The watershed being fragile, 62% of the area is under intensive agricultural practice. Land-use and spatial relationships in the perspective of conservation are presented in this paper.

Great genetic diversity of agricultural crops and trees has been recorded in this small watershed. Conservation ethics of optimum utilization/production of the resources, following traditional practices without much degrading of the system which is believed to be sustainable, was practised earlier in the watershed. But recently, due to population pressure and fragmentation of farm-owning families, the balance of land-use, natural resource utilization, and conservation, has become perturbed. Examples of traditional adaptation, indigenous knowledge, and perception of conservation amongst farm-owning families, are also presented in the paper.

Airbone particulate samples were collected during 1989 in the northern Negev desert, Israel, using two Sierra ultra-high-volume dust samplers with cascade impactors on glass-fibre filters. A total of 12 elements were detected, of which only eight were present in relatively high concentrations, as was indicated by using an x-ray spectra XL-LINK system. During the study period, the mean annual airborne concentration was 102 μg·m−3, with a minimum and maximum concentration of 0.17 and 1.376 μg·m−3 per 12 hours, respectively. Eight elements (A1, Si, Ca, S, K, Cl, Fe, and Ti) were found in relatively high concentrations.

The coal-mining industry plays a vital role towards meeting the energy demands of the people of India. Whether the mining is opencast or underground, however, it affects the environment and ecology of the region. Land is a non-renewable resource and is the main component damaged by mining. In India, exploitation of minerals was carried out in early days with virtually no regard for land protection. Underground mining causes subsidence of strata, mine fires, disturbance of the water-table, topographic disorder, and damage to the land-use pattern.

A fact-finding survey was made at an underground coal project of Raniganj Coalfield in Eastern India, to assess the impact of mining on the topsoil, the study area being described. Generally the soils of the local agricultural land are brownish-grey and smooth while those of the ‘danga’ lands are yellowish brown with fine rock materials, the textural quality being, respectively, sandy loam and loamy sand. Field tests such as infiltration rate and field capacity were measured at all the sampling locations, and graphical representation of the infiltration rates are given.

Infiltration rates of ‘danga’ land were found to be higher than those of agricultural land, due to their generally coarser texture. Field capacity of agricultural lands were found to range from 17.94 to 21.05%, and of ‘danga’ lands from 12.86 to 14.65%. Wilting coefficients were found to range from 5.31 to 6.75% for agricultural land and from 4.70 to 5.25% for ‘danga’ land. Bulk density, soil pH, conductivity, moisture content, and fertility status of the area, were also studied and the results discussed. Soils are deficient in nutrients. Kharif crops give an average yield of 5.05 quintals (each of 100 kg) per acre (0.405 ha) and Rabi crops only 4.88 quintals per acre. Underground mining activity will create land subsidence and disturb the water-table, finally having a negative impact on the topsoil of the area.