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| International development and poverty |
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Why work on international development?
WWF-UK's work on international development
WWF network's work on international development
Why does WWF work on international development?
Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of people today without compromising those of future generations. It is about living within our means, valuing nature's services and ensuring development potential for those who follow us. Sustainable development means balancing economic needs with environmental and social needs - a tripartite alliance. The conservation of nature and natural processes is not an optional extra; rather, it is the foundation of human welfare because of the vital ecosystem services they provide, such as the provision of water, food and medicines.
There is a need to place ecosystem sustainability and sustainable livelihoods at the heart of development policies and programmes. Growth of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is still the primary development paradigm for both developed and developing countries, despite efforts by a number of agencies to place environmental considerations into development. Yet it is clear from WWF's Living Planet Report 2006, and its ecological footprint analysis, that the present path of development is not sustainable. Until development is measured by environmental and social considerations, as well as economic, this will remain the case.
The overarching United Nations Millennium Development Goals is to halve extreme poverty by the year 2015. But at the same time our planet's capacity to sustain us is eroding. The problems are well known: degrading agricultural land, shrinking forests, diminishing supplies of clean water, fish stocks in crisis, and growing social and ecological vulnerability from climate change and loss of biological diversity. Another Millennium Development Goal is to ensure environmental sustainability. If we do not arrest and reverse the erosion of natural resources, the world will not be able to sustain any gains made in poverty reduction.
WWF-UK
The main priority of WWF-UK's International Development Programme is the integration of environmental considerations into the agenda of development aid agencies and international institutions. This includes:
- Lobbying development agencies
The policies of many development and government aid agencies ignore the crucial links between poverty and the environment and often exclude the most marginalised of people. 60 per cent of the poorest people live in ecologically fragile areas and depend directly on their local environment. To address environmental management and poverty reduction, there is a need to manage and sustain the long-term capacity of the environment to provide the goods and services on which human development depends, and ensure secure and equitable access by the poor to environmental assets.
WWF-UK lobbies such development agencies to integrate environmental sustainability into all policies and programmes in order to stop the degradation of the natural environment and reverse the loss of environmental resources by 2015, in accordance with the UN's Millennium Development Goals.
- Shared concerns - working with other NGOs
WWF-UK also works closely with other non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to advance the shared concerns of the development and environment agendas. For instance, WWF-UK co-chairs the Development and Environment Group of NGOs, and is a member of the Real World Coalition, which recently published From Here to Sustainability: Politics in the Real World. To order a copy, visit www.realworld.org.uk.
WWF-UK and DFID Partnership Programme Agreement (PPA) 2005 - 2011
WWF network
International Development Programme
Working with other WWF offices around the world, our International Development Programme covers most areas of WWF's work - managing and protecting environmental resources such as freshwater, forests, seas, plants and wildlife - for the benefit of local people and the future of the planet.
- On the ground, the programme includes integrating conservation with development programmes centred on the needs of local people.
- At the economic level, it encompasses developing incentives and tools, such as Strategic Environmental Analysis or valuation of natural resources, and ensuring the environmental impact of production and consumption is incorporated into the costs of goods and services.
- At the institutional level, it involves public advocacy to bring environmental imperatives to the forefront of national or international decision-making, plans and policies.
- At the public level it involves education and providing information to people to make informed choices.
Other offices within the WWF network that work on international development include:
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WWF-UK > Research > The issues we work on > International development and poverty
