How do HIV and AIDS impact the use of natural resources by poor rural populations? The case of wild animal products

Abstract

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.

HIV/AIDS and other household shocks as catalysts of local commercialization of non‐timber forest products in Southern Africa

“…Although each trader group in Malawi and South Africa encountered more non-AIDS proxy shocks than AIDS proxy shocks, they ranked AIDS proxy shocks as being more significant due to the intensity and duration of their impact. Kgathi, Ngwenya, & Wilk (2007) working in northwest Botswana found the same, with HIV/AIDS posing a shock like no other to households and livelihoods and for which they had only limited prior experience and coping mechanisms. The sheer brunt of the HIV/ AIDS pandemic often results in shocks far more significant than the majority of other shocks rural households are frequently subject to, especially when in quick succession and impacting prime age adults and breadwinners (de Waal & Whiteside, 2003;Mushongah & Scoones, 2012).…”

“…The effects of HIV/AIDS were gauged by proxy, using parameters adapted from the SADC FANR Vulnerability Assessment Committee guidelines (), which have been widely used in HIV/AIDS research in the region (McGarry & Shackleton, ; Kaschula & Shackleton, ; Abu‐Basutu, ). These five HIV/AIDS proxies are: (1) presence in the household of chronic illness (over three months) of a person between the ages of 0 and 56, (2) presence of chronic illness of a person between the ages of 0 and 56 and receiving free treatment, (3) recent death (last two years) in the household of someone between the age of 0 and 56, (4) recent death in the household of someone between the age of 0 and 56 who experienced at least three months of chronic illness before death, and (5) the presence of children under 19 with both parents deceased.…”

Medicinal Plants Used as Home Remedies: A Family Survey by First Year Medical Students

“…The classroom constituted first year medical students registered at Walter Sisulu University. With the unprecedented explosion in the popularity of herbal preparations especially associated with the HIV/AIDS pandemic and chronic illnesses of lifestyle, patients self-medicate with or without informing their physicians (Erasto et al, 2005;Kaschula and Shackleton, 2012;WHO, 2002).…”