Natural resource use and environmental perceptions in different types of rural villages in Bushbuckridge, South Africa

Abstract

Households in rural communities in developing countries rely on natural resources that contribute to income generation, food, medicine, cooking energy, and act as livelihood safety nets. Levels of dependency vary between households within communities due to factors such as wealth status and household size. However, less is known about differences in household resource use between communities within an area. Environmental awareness, values, and preferences are shaped by various factors including, local context. Thus, perceptions of the environment and natural resources, and changes in these are likely to vary between communities. This study aimed to compare the levels of natural resource use and environmental perceptions across village types and determine if there is any relationship between the level of natural resource use and environmental perceptions across village types in the Bushbuckridge Local Municipality in the Mpumalanga province, South Africa. Village types were defined and categorised based on their size, socio-economic factors, access to basic services, connectedness, and remoteness. The level of natural resource use was analysed using existing data from a survey of 491 households across 12 villages located in the Agincourt Health and Demographic Surveillance System (AHDSS) site. This included data on the use, collection, buying, and selling of a range of natural resources used locally (e.g., wild foods, firewood, and medicinal plants), annual consumptions, ownership of resources made from natural resources, and livestock (cattle) ownership. The survey included questions on respondents’ perception of the change in the supply of natural resources over the past 5 years (2016-2021) before the survey. Focus group discussions were conducted in 10 of the study villages asking participants their perception of the changes in the environment and the causes thereof, the importance of the natural environment, natural resources used for their daily needs, income generation, their culture, as well as the changes in availability of natural resources and impacts on their livelihoods. The study villages were classified according to a village typology that had been developed for the AHDSS study site, based on factors such as connectedness, access to amenities and services, and the proportion of Mozambican refugee households. ANOVA and Kruskal Wallis tests were used for continual data, while the Chi-squared test was used for categorical data to test for significant differences across village types in the quantitative part of the study. For qualitative, responses of participants from each village were recorded and grouped into village types, and an overall picture of the perception of natural resources that participants used was developed using the focus group schedule. Similarities and differences in natural resources between villages were assessed by grouping widely and less used resources by villages and village types. There was no significant difference (p>0.05) in the mean prevalence of use, collection, buying, and selling of natural resources, or annual consumption of natural resources across villages and village types. Households in better-serviced villages owned more products from natural resources and were to greater extent, likely to own livestock than poorly-serviced villages. As to environmental perceptions, more respondents in the poorly serviced village types (refugee settlements (RS) and underdeveloped communities (UC)) perceived a decrease in the supply of natural resources than better-serviced village types (established communities (EC) and central communities (CC)). Participants in focus group discussions also noted a decrease in the supply of natural resources across all villages and village types. There was a relationship between village types, natural resource use, and perceptions of change in natural resource availability. Established communities correlated with a higher number of resources perceived as decreasing and central communities were associated with higher cattle ownership. Underdeveloped communities and refugee settlements were associated with a higher number of resources used/owned, a higher number of resources used often (more than 4 times a month), and a higher number of resources sold, and buying firewood. Natural resources were more highly used in, better-serviced village types (central communities, and established communities), than in poorly-serviced village types (underdeveloped communities, and refugee settlements), which was unexpected. However, there were quite a few proxies such as the collection and selling of resources, which were used that did not help back up these findings which could explain the unexpected results. Most respondents in remote and poorly-serviced village types perceived a change in the supply of natural resources, the greatest decrease being in the supply of natural resources. This is associated with awareness of the value of the environment and high reliance on natural resources for these poorly-serviced village types. This study suggests that differences exist in resource use patterns between villages, even in the same area. However, village characteristics were not a good predictor of all aspects of resource use. Changes in proxies of resource utilization and re-evaluating the existing village typology would be useful for further studies.