Household afflicted by HIV/AIDS are particularly prone to food insecurity. This article explores the role of community networks in meeting household food deficits. One hundred households exhibiting a range (0-5) of HIV/AIDS proxies related to orphan fostering, prime adult chronic illness and mortality were visited at quarterly intervals for a year. At each assessment, donated food types consumed in the past 48 h were recorded, and household food security was monitored through an experiential measure. Factors determining access to donated foods were explored qualitatively by means of participant observation and semi-structured interviews. Poor households with prime adult chronic illness were prone to food insecurity, and used the most donated foods. However, not all households perceived to be afflicted with HIV/AIDS were able to access donated foods due to stigma and social exclusion. Concerted action must be taken by government, non-government and community agents if social food transfer networks are to be transformed into coordinated community action.
Fuelwood is still the primary energy source for rural households across the savannah biome of Africa. Coppice growth is an important species-specific trait that strongly influences fuelwood production and regeneration, and yet coppice growth patterns are poorly understood in African savannahs. It is therefore vital that factors affecting coppice growth of species, such as environment conditions and harvesting technique, be better understood in order to develop models for sustainable fuelwood use. This study investigated coppice growth and resource allocation strategies in relation to (1) position along the landscape catena and (2) harvesting technique, for three savannah fuelwood tree species: Dichrostachys cinerea, Albizia harveyi and Combretum collinum. The study was conducted in a dystrophic semi-arid savannah in the far north-east of South Africa. A total of 1146 harvested stumps were sampled in topland and bottomland sites in three locations around a rural village. Stump characteristics (diameter and height) and coppice shoot variables (number of shoots, length and diameter of each shoot, length of longest shoot, and diameter of fattest shoot) were measured for each stump. Three soil samples were taken in each site for physical and chemical analysis. No statistically significant differences were found in soil variables between topland and bottomland sites, probably due to low sample size. Coppice resource allocation strategies varied between species. D. cinerea exhibited a ‘quantity-driven’ strategy, with the production of large numbers of relatively small coppice shoots with high length:diameter ratio (shoot taper function). C. collinum exhibited a ‘quality-driven’ strategy, characterized by the production of a relatively low number of larger coppice shoots. Coppice growth variables for A. harveyi were intermediate between those of the other two species, suggesting a strategy where allocation of resources to the number and growth of shoots is more balanced. However, allocation of resources relative to the size of the cut stem, indexed by total shoot basal area:stump basal area ratio, did not differ significantly between species. Coppice growth was strongly favoured in bottomland sites for D. cinerea, and to a lesser degree, C. collinum. Catenal position had a negligible influence on coppice growth of A. harveyi. Number of shoots produced increased with cutting height for all three species. For all three species the number of shoots increased with stump diameter, and mean shoot size also increased with stump size for D. cinerea. There was a significant negative relationship between stump diameter and total shoot basal area:stump basal area ratio for A. harveyi and C. collinum. A framework for optimizing different coppice growth variables according to species, catenal position and harvesting technique is given.
SUMMARYWhen compared to tropical forest zones in west and central Africa, off-take of wild meat from savannah and grassland biomes by local rural communities has not been well assessed. This case study of wild meat collection activities within a rural community in the Mount Frere region of the Eastern Cape (South Africa) uses last-catch records derived from 50 wild meat gatherers to calculate average off-take of taxa, species and fresh mass of wild meat per collection event. When per-event off take is overlaid onto household hunting frequency data, annual off-take would be 268.6 kg km−2 yr−1 or 3 kg person−1 yr−1 presuming constant off-take over an annual period. Monetary value of off-take would be South African R 307 (US$ 39) per household annually. For some species, off-take weight per km2 shows similar values to data from tropical forest zones, but high human population densities tend to dilute off-takes to less nutritionally significant amounts at the per person scale. However, unlike many tropical zones, none of the species harvested can be considered high-priority conservation species. Even densely populated and heavily harvested communal lands appear to offer high wild meat off-takes from low conservation priority species.
As a result of heightened financial and food insecurity, populations adversely affected by HIV and/or AIDS may be more likely to utilise wild natural resources to supplement their diet and livelihoods. Should this effect be pronounced, HIV and AIDS may pose a serious environmental threat. We explored the hypothesis that the presence of factors in the household, such as chronic illness in and recent mortality of individuals in a high HIV-risk age group, as well as the fostering of orphans, are associated with increased utilisation of wild animal products (WAPs) at the household level. We randomly surveyed 519 households from four sites in rural South Africa, recording household socio-economic status, the utilisation of wild animal products and health and demographic factors attributed to HIV or AIDS. Binary logistic regressions were used to test if households with markers of HIV and/or AIDS affliction were more likely to have a higher incidence and frequency of WAP utilisation relative to non-afflicted households, after adjusting for socio-economic and demographic variables. We found that, although households with markers of HIV and/or AIDS were generally poorer and had higher dependency ratios, there was no evidence to support the hypothesis that WAP harvesting was associated with either poverty, or markers of HIV and/or AIDS affliction. Our findings suggest that generalisations about a possible interaction between HIV and/or AIDS and the environment may not uniformly apply to all categories of natural resources or to all user groups.
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