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Poverty-eradication and
Sustainable Development
Introduction
This paper examines South Africa’s record since 1992 in eradi-
cating poverty within a sustainable development framework as
spelt out in Agenda 21, the document adopted in that year by
the Earth summit in Rio de Janeiro. It begins by presenting a
brief snapshot of poverty in South Africa, the better to appre-
ciate the magnitude of the challenge of poverty eradication.
The next section presents an analytical overview of the rela-
tionship between poverty and the environment. Then, it
examines specific anti-poverty initiatives of the government,
and asks how successful they are in terms of reducing poverty,
and to what degree they do so in a manner that is consistent
with the principles of sustainable development. The paper
concludes by summarising the success of the government’s
anti-poverty measures in terms of the principles of the
National Environmental Management Act (Nema), and by
making recommendations for how some of the lapses could be
addressed.
Two qualifications should be indicated. First, although Agenda
21 was adopted in 1992, in practice our point of departure is
more typically 1994, i.e. the year in which the first racially-
inclusive democratic elections took place, and the ANC-led
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government took power. This year represented a watershed not
just in terms of power relations, but also coincided with the
introduction of new approaches to development and poverty
alleviation. Second, in some instances the anti-poverty govern-
ment initiatives examined are not project interventions as such
but rather broad policy frameworks. In these cases, we ask not
how successful the frameworks have been in reducing poverty
through sustainable development (because that would be
exceptionally difficult to infer), but rather how coherent they
are in terms of poverty eradication through sustainable deve-
lopment, and their likely influence in the pursuit thereof.
A brief overview of poverty in South Africa
The particular configuration of poverty in South Africa is a
fairly straightforward outcome of colonial and apartheid
engineering. The most salient elements of this engineering were
large-scale land dispossession, the establishment of increasingly
overcrowded and poorly resourced homelands for the majority
black population, and the migratory labour system that formed
the backbone of the country’s mining and industrial sectors.
The geographical, racial, and gender dimensions of contem-
porary poverty are in large measure the legacy of this historical
experience. The focus here is on three aspects of poverty –
namely income poverty, quality of life and inequality.
Income poverty Based on a per adult equivalent poverty line
of R352 per month, in 1995 61% of Africans were poor, 38%
of coloureds, 5% of Indians, and 1% of whites (May et al.,
2000). Although the data are old and the percentages have
likely changed in the meantime, the stark racial differentiation
certainly still obtains. There is also a strong geographical
dimension to the incidence of poverty. Based on the same data
set, 72% of all poor people (those below the poverty line)
reside in rural areas, and 71% of all rural people are poor. By
most measures, the poorest provinces are those encompassing
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the most populous former homeland areas, namely KwaZulu-
Natal, Northern Province, and Eastern Cape.
A reasonable proxy for income poverty is child under-
nutrition. Around 23 per cent of children under six years of age
are stunted, indicating a protracted period of under-nutrition
(Steyn, 2000). The most seriously affected children are those in
rural areas whose mothers have relatively little education. In
addition, the infant mortality rate is eight to ten times higher
for blacks than for whites.
The way in which data are captured in Stats SA's main
annual survey, i.e. the October Household Survey, is not
comparable to that for the Income and Expenditure Survey of
1995, upon which the headcount measures reported above are
based. For that reason, it is not possible to state trends in the
headcount measure of income poverty since 1995.
1
However,
the direction of the trend is not difficult to guess, given the
close relationship between poverty and unemployment. For
example, among those who were below the poverty line in
1995, the unemployment rate was 55%, where as among those
above the poverty line, the unemployment rate was 14% (May
et al., 2000). In terms of formal sector employment, in the 5
years since 1996 there has been a contraction of more than
800 000 jobs, or about 5% of the workforce. While there has
been a countervailing increase in informal sector employment,
it is well known that these jobs are much less remunerative on
average (Kingdon & Knight, 2000). The implication is that,
most likely, the prevalence of income poverty has worsened
over the past half decade.
An important dimension of income poverty that is receiving
more and more attention is its duration. Based on data from
KwaZulu-Natal, it would appear that more than half of those
households that were poor in 1998, were also poor in 1993,
meaning that they are ‘chronically poor’ (Roberts, 2000). At
least for the KwaZulu-Natal data set, the incidence of chronic
poverty tends to be much higher among rural households,
female-headed households, households with older household
heads, and those households with below-average access to less
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arable land. The experience of ‘transitory’ or ‘episodic’ poverty
– i.e. households that escaped poverty between 1993 and 1998
or, conversely, fell into poverty between 1993 and 1998 – is
largely a function of employment transitions, in terms of a
household member getting or losing a key job (Cichello, Fields
& Leibbrandt, 2000).
Quality of life By this we mean aspects of the experience of
well-being not necessarily related to personal income. One
major contributor to a good quality of life is access to services
and infrastructure, such as potable water, electricity, roads, etc.
Such services impact on quality of life in a number of ways, eg.
by diminishing the time or energy needed to collect water or
fuel wood, by diminishing the risks associated with unprotect-
ed water sources, poor waste disposal, or charcoal fires, and by
facilitating engagement in economic activities. Not surprising-
ly, access to services is highly differentiated between rural and
urban areas. As of 1995, only 21 per cent of rural households
had electricity within the house, against 82 per cent for urban
households. For indoor running water, the figures were 17 per
cent and 74 per cent respectively. While these gaps may have
narrowed somewhat under the post-apartheid government’s
infrastructure drive, the backlog remains large across the
whole range of services.
Other aspects of quality of life may be less tangible, but no
less important to the experience of poverty or non-poverty.
The Speak Out on Poverty Hearings sponsored by the South
African NGO Coalition (Sangoco) in 1998, evoked many of
the experiential aspects of poverty, including exposure to
crime and violence, a sense of vulnerability and powerlessness,
disrespect from government officials (eg. those responsible for
pension payouts), etc. The same could be said of the South
African Participatory Poverty Appraisal (SA-PPA) of 1999/
2000, which vividly portrayed the relationship of poverty to
hopelessness, social isolation and family fragmentation (May et
al., 1997).
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Inequality Inequalities in South Africa are extreme, as already
suggested by some of the headcount measures reported on
page 3. South Africa’s individual-based Gini coefficient is 0.73
(StatsSA, 2000), which is only excelled by a handful of
countries in the world. As shown in May et al. (1997), the
wealthiest ten per cent of the country’s households account for
40 per cent of all private income earned, and seven per cent of
the total population (implying smaller-than-average household
size). By contrast, the poorest 40 per cent of households
account for only 11 per cent of total income. As made evident
in the course of the poverty hearings, perceptions of continued
inequality do much to contribute to the disillusionment and
frustration associated with material poverty.
Inequality is also evident in terms of access to services,
health status, etc. For example, 18 per cent of households
within the poorest decile must travel more than one
kilometre to access water, versus 1 per cent of households in
the top three deciles (Budlender, 1999).
Poverty and environment in South Africa
Although the pre-1994 government attached considerable
significance to conservation of natural environments, its
approach required exclusion of local people from the environ-
mentally protected areas converted into parks and reserves to
serve conservation and recreational interests. The impact of
these protected areas on the culture, livelihoods and environ-
ments of local people did not receive much attention. The
communities that were removed were often resettled on
inferior land (according to apartheid group areas or outside
the proclaimed parks), where previous livelihoods could not
be sustained and crowded conditions led to further degrada-
tion of the land. This series of events served to reinforce the
already prevalent view that poor people impact negatively on
the environment, which therefore needs to be protected by
their exclusion. The fact that poverty was often exacerbated as
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a consequence of already depleted or inferior environments
and the hidden costs of large-scale industrial exploitation was
largely ignored.
A fuller understanding of the relationship between
environment and poverty needs to take into account the
complex relations existing within each system. The environ-
ment is composed not only of ‘things’ but more importantly
the relations between them. Ecological relatedness of orga-
nisms is one example; how people relate to their environment
is another. Environmental degradation occurs as a consequence
of skewed power relationships where environmental resources
are used faster than nature produces them, or where wastes
from human production / consumption pollute the environ-
ment faster than nature can clean them. The potential for
environmental degradation is therefore inherent in human
existence (people sustain their living from the environment)
and not a recent phenomenon, but the current pace and global
scale of environmental degradation are unprecedented (Butler
& Hallows, 1998).
Similarly, poverty can be understood as a system of rela-
tionships that have the cumulative effect of excluding people
from processes of development and accumulation. Skewed
power relations and economic, political or social injustices that
deny people access to empowering resources such as safe
water, health services or education can be contributing factors.
The viability of people’s livelihoods is often largely contingent
on relationships that ensure the continued access to environ-
mental resources. Such continued access, however, requires
not only the sustained provision of resources but also the just
and equitable access to them. Sustainable development can
thus be thought of as a pattern of relations between people
and between people and the environment that will ensure and
not undermine future development (Butler & Hallows, 1998).
What form should sustainable development take to benefit
people and their environment? What forms of interaction exist
currently and what kinds of interactions would be desirable or
necessary to maximise mutual benefits? The interface between
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poverty and environment is multi-layered and complex, often
appearing as self-perpetuating cycles or escalating downward
spirals. For example: many poor rural South Africans occupy
inferior land; in their attempt to eke out a living, they contri-
bute to the downgrading of their environment; the impove-
rished environment exacerbates prevailing poverty, which in
turn puts more pressure on the environment. Such cycles are
hard to break and even more difficult to reverse.
A useful summary of the ways in which poverty and environ-
ment may interact is provided by Parnell’s (2000) five main
ways of understanding the interdependencies between poverty
and the environment. These are: poverty and environmental
governance; poverty, disasters and risk mitigation; poverty, the
environment and livelihoods; poverty and environmental
degradation; and poverty and environmental justice and
entitlement. Together, these modes of interaction provide an
overview of issues that need to be addressed, while a closer look
into each area reveals its complex nature and inter-relatedness
within the South African context, not least in relation to
development. These interdependencies are described here, with
an attempt to illustrate them through the historical example of
the former Betterment Schemes (see page 11).
Poverty and environmental governance ‘Environmental gover-
nance’ describes a form of decision-making and environmental
management that requires shared responsibility and the involve-
ment of all affected parties. Such a thoroughly democratic
approach sets out to achieve greater efficiency as well as better
access and improved management. The move towards
governance is partly motivated by the failure of orthodox
approaches, where inadequate consultation or imposed ‘solu-
tions’ jeopardise outcomes, as localised root causes remain
unaddressed because local people – especially low-income
people – are not involved and therefore ‘uncooperative’ since
their most pressing needs are largely unmet.
Poverty, disasters and risk mitigation Extreme natural events
exerting a cumulative or large-scale negative impact on the
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livelihoods of vulnerable people – i.e. disasters – are seldom
entirely natural. Many human-made factors contribute to
natural hazards, either by creating environmental conditions
conducive to disaster, or through ‘social processes and condi-
tions that leave people vulnerable, exposing them to shock
while rendering them unable to maintain their ability to meet
their own basic needs’ (Parnell, 2000). Among the factors that
contribute to increased vulnerability or an environmental
predisposition to disasters are population growth; urbanisa-
tion; inadequate settlement regulation; international financial
interventions; land degradation; global changes in environment
and climate; and war.
In the short term, natural extremes are beyond human
control, other than by refining available methods of forecasting
and intervening to minimise the impact. Far more effective
control can be applied to the human behaviour affecting
environmental hazards and to political, social and economic
systems of unjust power relations that leave people vulnerable
and unable to prepare for and respond to disaster. Mitigation
of risks, either to reduce the likelihood of a negative event or
to improve people’s ability to cope in the face of such an
event, presents considerable scope for development in the
areas of poverty and environment.
Poverty, the environment and livelihoods The livelihoods
model pays attention to relationships at a micro-level, with the
understanding that access to resources is contingent on
relationships within a household, within the wider community
and to the economy at large. In some areas the poor organise
and maximise largely in non-monetary terms, thus their
livelihood strategies are heavily reliant on natural resources
and/or social capital. Most rural households, however, pursue
diversified livelihood strategies, thus even those who do not
identify themselves as farmers may rely on natural resources to
a very important degree. The question about what social
conditions might serve to maximise the opportunities afforded
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by natural or environmental resources needs to be addressed in
both rural and urban contexts.
The livelihoods approach helps one to appreciate different
perspectives of policy-makers with respect to the relationship
between low-income households and the environment, be they
explicit or implicit (Salafsky & Wollenberg, 2000). In the
‘protected area strategy’, local livelihoods are regarded as a
threat to the environment and are therefore summarily
excluded. A great deal of power is necessary to establish and
maintain protected areas and to stop local stakeholders from
violating regulations, and, as such, threats to the environment
are not mitigated but are merely being kept at bay. This
approach was widely practised by the apartheid government
and contributed a great deal to current conditions of poverty
and environmental degradation. With the ‘substitution
strategy’, local stakeholders are allowed limited access to
protected areas, but substitute livelihood activities are
promoted for the sake of mitigating the pressure on those areas.
Harmful livelihood activities are still contained by authority,
thus requiring costly maintenance in the face of ongoing threat
to the environment. Finally, the ‘linked incentives strategy’ sets
out to establish a system whereby promotion of livelihoods and
care for the environment positively reinforce one another.
Rather than minimising or eliminating the inter-relatedness of
livelihoods with the environment, it attempts to accept reliance
on the environment in such a manner that care for the
environment becomes indispensable to livelihood practice and
continuity. This third strategy corresponds to the ethos of
sustainable development. While the micro-focus of the
livelihoods model takes into account people’s interests and
relationships it tends to understate macro-influences such as
the formal economy and global pressures.
Poverty and environmental degradation, war and disease
While traditional perspectives on environmental degradation
maintained the destructive impact of the poor, the ‘new
degradationists’ shift the emphasis from physical degradation
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to the social costs of unsustainable consumption and produc-
tion. The poor are disproportionately exposed to environ-
mental hazards and degradation as a consequence of social,
moral and political conditions, which contradict basic human
and environmental rights. War and civil conflict undermine
environmental justice and entitlement, thereby contributing
to environmental destruction and disease.
Poverty, and environmental justice and entitlement Unbalanc-
ed power relationships often leave the poor largely bearing the
costs of unsustainable and unjust practices, which further
disempower them and increase their vulnerability. Where
overarching patterns of inequality in respect of allocation of
water rights and the location of wastes and other hazards are
impacting on people’s lives, issues of degradation, pollution
and land use are being turned into mobilising platforms,
seeking social justice in environmental matters. Environment
has become a social issue of the present, taking into account
past and future generations. While civil organisations form
around issues of improved living conditions, the reduction of
inequality and justice in ‘environmental language’, their
struggles are reflected in the international recognition of
environmental entitlement as the rights of the poor to quality
and healthy neighbourhoods. The brutal social and environ-
mental consequences of war and environmental racism are
under scrutiny, while the empowering contribution of indige-
nous environmental knowledge and practice are receiving
increasing recognition.
A fuller appreciation of the different ways in which poverty
and environment are related provides a more complete picture
of the damaging reinforcement between poverty and environ-
mental stress in the past, as well as a vantage from which to
understand the post-apartheid government’s efforts to come
to grips with poverty eradication through sustainable
development.
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