Gender, population and environment in the context of deforestation: a Malaysian case study
Heyzer, N.
Ids Bulletin 26(1): 40-46
1995
ISSN/ISBN: 0308-5872 PMID: 12289812 Document Number: 303048
This article examines the impact of environmental change on competing livelihood systems in the Limbang District of Sarawak, Malaysia. Natural resource-dependent systems like those of upstream Penan and Kelabit communities appear to be far more vulnerable to environmental change than the midstream Iban and Lun Bawang whose livelihood systems are currently buttressed by lucrative market activity. For the four ethnic groups studied, gender relations have been exposed as an important variable in understanding community responses to declining resource availabilities. In Penan communities, in particular, gender interests, in manoeuvring around new environmental vulnerabilities, are being played out through population variables. However, differentiated property rights and divisions of labour are, at present, more marked within midstream communities and will increasingly require complex negotiations of conflicts of interests between men and women over resource management, allocation, utilization and entitlement.