Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-nmvwc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-15T06:30:40.971Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

9 - Conservation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2010

Michael Mortimore
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access

Summary

Conservation has different meanings for different people. For some it implies the exclusion of humans from protected natural reserves, and for others, the protection of threatened species or habitats in ecosystems that are already occupied or exploited by human populations. The impracticability, as well as the controversial ethics, of giving human needs second place to those of ‘nature’, has suggested to some writers the need for a multi-purpose strategy which not merely reconciles the sometimes contradictory demands of humans and nature conservation, but goes further to integrate the economic and conservationary management of the same habitats. In urbanised and industrialised Europe, such ideas have far-reaching implications (Adams 1996).

In dryland Africa, conservation thinking has two tributary traditions. The first is the demand, emanating from conservation lobbies in northern countries and tourism ministries of African governments, for protected reserves – protected, that is, from Africans. The drylands contain most of Africa's best known tourist game parks, and tourism is a major earner of foreign exchange in several national economies. The second is the soil conservation movement, which, having its historical roots in the USA in the 1920s and 1930s, became influential in colonial governments in the 1940s and 1950s (Anderson 1984; Huxley 1937; Stocking 1996). The thrust of soil conservation propaganda, particularly in its early years, was that African smallholders were recklessly destroying their natural resources by inappropriate land use practices.

Type
Chapter
Information
Roots in the African Dust
Sustaining the Sub-Saharan Drylands
, pp. 159 - 175
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1998

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Conservation
  • Michael Mortimore, University of Cambridge
  • Book: Roots in the African Dust
  • Online publication: 05 October 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511560064.010
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Conservation
  • Michael Mortimore, University of Cambridge
  • Book: Roots in the African Dust
  • Online publication: 05 October 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511560064.010
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Conservation
  • Michael Mortimore, University of Cambridge
  • Book: Roots in the African Dust
  • Online publication: 05 October 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511560064.010
Available formats
×