Development of alternative livelihoods has become a popular policy to uplift the socioeconomic status of small-scale fishers and to reduce fishing pressure on overexploited fisheries. Seaweed farming has been incorporated into many community-based coastal resources management projects and fisheries management initiatives as an alternative livelihood option for fishers in tropical developing cou...

In this paper we investigate the role of poultry in households’ livelihood portfolios, and the livelihood impacts of supply and demand shocks that may be caused by avian flu outbreaks and scares. We focus on four sub-Saharan African countries that represent a spectrum of disease status and spread. By using nationally representative data and econometric methods, we profile the characteristics of...

Climate change poses a significant threat to Africa, and deforestation rates have increased in recent years. Mitigation initiatives such as REDD+ are widely considered as potentially efficient ways to generate emission reductions (or removals), conserve or sustainably manage forests, and bring benefits to communities, but effective implementation models are lacking. This paper presents the case...

BACKGROUND Although many studies have been carried out to learn about maternal care practices in rural areas and urban-slums of Bangladesh, none have focused on ultra poor women. Understanding the context in which women would be willing to accept new practices is essential for developing realistic and relevant behaviour change messages. This study sought to fill in this knowledge gap by explori...

Links between the pond and surrounding land for horticulture is a distinctive feature of farming households in Bangladesh. It was hypothesised that the role of fishponds in integrated aquaculture systems has potential towards improving livelihoods and poverty alleviation. Rural and peri-urban settlements in Mymensingh District, Bangladesh were selected for assessing the importance and role of p...

This paper highlights the socio-economic impacts of HIV/AIDS on women. It argues that the socio-cultural beliefs that value the male and female lives differently lead to differential access to health care services. The position of women is exacerbated by their low financial base especially in the rural community where their main source of livelihood, agricultural production does not pay much. B...

Over 40% of the earth’s land surface are drylands that are home to approximately 2.5 billion people. Livelihood sustainability in drylands is threatened by a complex and interrelated range of social, economic, political, and environmental changes that present significant challenges to researchers, policy makers, and, above all, rural land users. Dynamic ecological and environmental change model...

Livelihoods in many rural areas of the world are complex and dynamic: perhaps the one constant is the day-to-day uncertainty of survival. The concept of livelihood is about individuals, households or groups making a living, attempting to meet their various consumption and economic necessities, coping with uncertainties and responding to new opportunities (De Haan and Zoomers 2003). Some of the ...

Over the decades, the Zabaleen, the traditional waste (garbage) collectors of Cairo, have created what is arguably one of the world‘s most efficient and sustainable resource-recovery and waste-recycling systems. Yet the continuation of this intricate relationship between community, environment and livelihood is jeopardized by the official privatization of municipal solid waste (MSW) services th...

A participatory environmental management plan was prepared for Tuzla Lake, Turkey. Fuzzy cognitive mapping approach was used to obtain stakeholder views and desires. Cognitive maps were prepared with 44 stakeholders (villagers, local decisionmakers, government and non-government organization (NGO) officials). Graph theory indices, statistical methods and "What-if" simulations were used in the a...