Gender, environment, and poverty interlinks: Regional variations and temporal shifts in rural India, 19711991
Bina Agarwal
World Development 25(1): 23-52
1997
ISSN/ISBN: 0305-750X DOI: 10.1016/s0305-750x(96)00084-8Document Number: 525100
The interrelationships between gender, poverty and the environment in rural India are examined, focusing in particular on regional variations and temporal shifts over 1971-91. Briefly identifying the major factors underlying environmental degradation, the paper traces why and how this degradation, and the appropriation of natural resources by the state (statization) and by some individuals (privatization), tend to have particularly adverse implications for the female members of poor rural households. Regional and temporal variations in the likely intensity of these effects are traced both by examining individual indicators and through the specification of a set of aggregative indices, termed here as the GEP(V) indices. These indices measure differences between states in their gender-environment-poverty vulnerability (or what could be termed the "GEP-gap") at a point in time, and over time. Governmental and community-initiated attempts at environmental protection and regeneration are also examined, and the importance of gender-directed policies highlighted.