Poverty and Conservation

This is an interesting and useful story about Chinese biologist Pan Wenshi's mission to protect the white-headed langur and its forest habitat.

What is so useful about it is that it again shows that the way to protecting wildlife and ecosystems is alleviating the poverty of local residents. People use the forests to survive. They ate the white-headed langur for food. They cut down the forests for firewood. But Pan went in and built biogas digesters, which use the methane produced by domestic animal waste for fuel. By giving them these cheap devices, the people had much less reason to cut down trees. Now they could focus on other activities, making their lives easier and protecting the forest at the same time.

Alleviating poverty is not the only needed course of action. A huge problem in China is that newly rich and powerful people want to use wild animals for food and medicine as conspicious consumption. That had become a huge problem for the white-headed langur. But with the help of locals, newly interested in conservation because not destroying the forest was making their lives better, that has been curtailed for the present.

This story has larger significance for environmental efforts worldwide. Environmental organizations must make it worth people's while to protect nature. We can go in as westerners and try to save land and wildlife but without strong governments dedicated to that protection, local residents are likely to ignore those laws and go on trying to feed their families. Environmental protection must go hand in hand with economic justice.