Environmental Change, Risky Sexual Behavior, and the HIV/AIDS Pandemic: Linkages Through Livelihoods in Rural Haiti

Abstract

Local natural resources are central to rural livelihoods across much of the developing world. Such “natural capital” represents one of several types of assets available to households as they craft livelihood strategies. In order to explore the potential for environmental scarcity and change to contribute to perpetuation of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, we examine the association between declining natural capital and engaging in risky sexual behaviors, as potentially another livelihood strategy. Such association has been demonstrated in Kenya and Tanzania, through the fish-for-sex trade. To explore the possibility of this connection within rural Haitian livelihoods we use Demographic and Health Survey data, with a focus on rural women, combined with vegetation measures generated from satellite imagery. We find that lack of condom use in recent sexual encounters is associated with local environmental scarcity – controlling for respondent age, education, religion and knowledge of AIDS preventive measures. The results suggest that explicit consideration of the environmental dimensions of HIV/AIDS may be of relevance in scholarship examining factors shaping the pandemic.

Exploring Child Mortality Risks Associated with Diverse Patterns of Maternal Migration in Haiti

“…Four out of five Haitians are unemployed (World Bank 2006), and the absence of steady employment opportunities leave women (and men) searching constantly for new economic opportunities (Farmer, Léandre, Mukherjee, Claude, Nevil, Smith-Fawzi, Koenig, Castro, Becerra, and Sachs 2001). In rural areas, most women work in the agricultural sector (Charmes 2000); however, the country’s large-scale environmental degradation continuously threatens agricultural output (Hunter, Reid-Hresko, and Dickinson 2011). Thus, many rural women migrate to other rural communities where superior cultivation opportunities are available or to Haiti’s urban centers in search of employment in petty trade, industry, or domestic work (Ahlers 1978).…”

Economic Context and HIV Vulnerability in Adolescents and Young Adults Living in Urban Slums in Kenya: A Qualitative Analysis Based on Scarcity Theory

“…In Nigeria, a study also found that attempts to mitigate food deprivation partly explained slum adolescent girls’ engaging in risky sexual behaviors [77]. The observation that men have more non-sexual opportunities to earn income has been documented in Mozambique and Haiti [28, 78], and was also described among our youth in Kenya. There has been some evidence as well suggesting that young men in Lesotho increased demand for sex partners once obtaining employment or income [76], and that economic hardship for Zimbabwean men diminished their capacity to support sexual relationships [79].…”

Transactional Fish-for-Sex Relationships Amid Declining Fish Access in Kenya

“…In sub-Saharan Africa, fish-for-sex has garnered particular attention largely because of exceptionally high prevalence of HIV around inland lakes, including Lake Victoria (Béné & Merten, 2008;Kwena, Camlin, Shisanya, Mwanzo, & Bukusi, 2013;MacPherson et al, 2012). More broadly, a burgeoning literature seeks to link HIV to environmental change (Fiorella, 2013;Hunter, Reid-Hresko, & Dickinson, 2011;Mojola, 2011;Talman, Bolton, & Walson, 2013).…”