PROTECTING OUR ENVIRONMENT

Water Factsheet (234 kb) | Environmental Sustainability Factsheet(151 kb) | Slumdwellers Factsheet(215 kb) | DFID's approach to the Environment(858 kb) | Water and sanitation


Poor people often have limited access to clean water and fresh air, fertile land and fertile crops, and the healthy livestock and other animals that are essential for livelihoods and health. Also, it is the poor who usually bear the brunt of environmental hazards and degradation. In addition, poor people and poor countries are dependent on natural resources such as timber, agricultural crops, fuel and minerals for their livelihoods and for economic growth. So, sound environmental management and the sustainable use of natural resources are essential to economic growth in developing countries.

DFID is helping to tackle environmental problems by:
committing to double our assistance to water and sanitation in Africa to £95 million a year by 2007/08, and more than double funding again to £200 million by 2010/11.
supporting a programme with civil society organisations in Kenya to better represent the needs of poor communities to government and make improvements in legislation to benefit poor people.
significantly increased research funding to improve the capacity of African countries to adapt to climate change.
working to improve climate science in Africa through the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS).
helping to develop guidance on how to screen all development investments for the effects of climate change.
support UN Habitat, the UN agency leading on urban development and shelter, to improve the lives of slum-dwellers.
fund a number of regional and country programmes, such as the large urban services programmes in Kolkata Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh in India, which total £266 million.

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There are however, a number of environmental problems to tackle:
assessments of national development plans by the World Bank have shown limited integration of the environment;
environmental assets (such as clean water, clean air, fertile crops) provide roughly two-thirds of household income for the rural poor, but the loss of environmental resources continues. Forest cover, for example, has declined by 7.3 million hectares per year over the past five years – an area about the size of Sierra Leone.
climate change is a major threat to development – natural disasters such as hurricanes and floods are expected to increase in intensity and severity. Higher temperatures will cause diseases like malaria to spread. Shorter and more changeable rainy seasons will cause crops to fail. Greater competition over resources could lead to conflict.
1.1 billion people still lack access to safe drinking water; 2.6 billion lack access to basic sanitation.
according to UN Habitat, there are currently 989 million slum-dwellers worldwide, and this is expected to increase to 1.4 billion by 2020 if current trends do not change.