The save study: background and methodology

Abstract

Considerable international debate has taken place on the relationship between economic development and its environmental implications (Sandbach, 1980). Historically, developed countries that have single- mindedly pursued economic growth at any price have often discovered that such growth, if it materialized at all, was generally accompanied by direct and adverse effects upon the environment This led to a polarized view of ‘growth’ and ‘conservation’, a view often aggravated by the different time perspectives adopted by ‘growth-promoters’ and ‘conservationists’. Resource economics has tended to stress the maximization of short-term benefits of resource use, whereas long-term, less-quantifiable social and ecological dimensions of resource utilization have received little consideration in this discipline. In contrast, environmental sciences are often concerned with the long-term effects of factors that may show no immediate effect (Dasmann etal., 1974). Resolution of this conflict has subsequently been proposed in the World Conservation Strategy, where conservation is defined as ‘the management of human use of the biosphere so that it may yield the greatest sustainable benefit to present generations, while maintaining its potential to meet the needs and aspirations of future generations’ (International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, 1980). In less developed countries the situation is complicated by the fact that underdevelopment is also a major cause of environmental degradation (Tolba, 1977). Social and economic development may contribute to the alleviation of poverty, which in turn may result in decreased envifon- mental impact. In other cases, however, economic growth has not necessarily eliminated poverty, and relative wealth differentials have instead simply been exacerbated. Recognition of this phenomenon led to the basic needs approach to the development process (International Labour Office, 1976).