October issue 2006

“Most development practitioners today do not understand the link between poverty and natural resources”

– Aban Marker Kabraji, Regional Director, IUCN, Asia

Aban Marker Kabraji is an eternal optimist. Despite being a woman, an environmentalist AND a Pakistani! “I’ve always had a positive sense of this country,” she tells me during our chat in her office — the same office she occupied as country representative of IUCN — The World Conservation Union in Pakistan. She has now moved to Bangkok as IUCN’s regional director for Asia, overseeing 10 country programmes and projects with partners in most of the continent’s 24 countries. But Pakistan is where her heart is — and where she is most at home. “I always love coming back home,” she tells me, likening it to a fish coming back to a familiar pond.

One of her barometers for optimism is the snow leopard translocation episode that IUCN Pakistan recently engineered. “The (translocation of the) snow leopard became a symbol of a more sophisticated, more responsible, more worldly-wise nation,” explains Aban with infectious conviction, and I find my heart swelling with patriotic pride. With economic indicators rising, Aban feels the bullish economy will bring expatriate Pakistanis back to the country, which in turn will bring about an openness and tolerance in Pakistani society. “It may not happen for another 20 years. We can only be part of this process of change, and make sure we accelerate it as much as possible,” she says.

Which has been her practice. How successful her efforts have been, is something she is quite modest and realistic about. It’s not easy to talk trees and leopards in a nation where almost half the population lives on less than a dollar a day. But much of her struggle has been to make policy-makers realise how closely linked the environment is to poverty. That the poor base their livelihood strategies almost entirely on natural resources, and the decline of our forests, rivers, rangelands, soils, seas, and the wildlife that inhabit them, plunges people deeper into poverty. That is where our interview begins…

A: Yes, I would agree as far as the poverty-environment nexus goes, but one has to be careful when you say poverty is the greatest polluter. It can sometimes be misinterpreted as saying that the poor pollute the greatest. What it actually means is, the impact of pollution is greatest on the poor. The poorer you are, the worse you are hit by any kind of degradation. The poor are most dependent on natural resources. For example, the poor have very few options for bottled water, so they must drink from lakes and streams in rural areas, or any kind of tap which is available. They are usually in those parts of the cities where pollution is the worst. So the impact of a degraded environment, urban or rural, is greatest on the poorest. The relationship between poverty and the environment is a complex one. It’s only when you understand biological cycles, natural rhythms, economic imperatives, the state of infrastructure in the cities, in the rural areas — or lack of it — that you really understand that nexus.

The sad thing is most development practitioners today do not understand the link between poverty and natural resources. They talk about poverty reduction, PRSP, but they don’t seem to mainstream the natural resource aspect into the very integral paradigm they are putting forward on development.

Q: Is that because poverty is not understood as a quality of life issue?

A: Absolutely. Poverty is only seen in economic terms. It’s not equated with the quality of life or even equity issues. Poverty is now focusing on women, and that has been largely a success of the women’s movement internationally. The environment movement is still struggling to persuade economic planners and governments that environmental considerations and natural resource use is as integral to the economic development agenda, as are the infrastructure aspects of development. This is partly because you are dealing with a generation of economists who have not been educated in understanding the much more multi-faceted, multi-sectoral aspect of this paradigm.

Q: What, then, has the environment movement achieved in Pakistan?

A: I always say, in order to assess what we’ve achieved, you have to think in terms of a film which has not ended. If at any point you freeze the frame, you really don’t understand the entire context of the story.

Our successes and achievements, I would say, are considerable in many ways — from where we started when environment was equivalent with, say, forest protection or animal protection, to where we are today where there is a much more sophisticated understanding, of it being integral to the development process, of it being part of the quality of life — there’s been an enormous change in terms of awareness.

You have civil society groups now that are focused entirely on the environment. You’ve got strategies, and policies and projects in place that are making an impact and changes.

But again, set that against Pakistan’s overall socio-economic development, and judge environmental success in the same way as you judge social indicators — health , education; the same political, economic and social constraints that keep us in the lower category of developing nations, underpin environmental achievements.

Q: Has the environment movement been sidelined in the period between the ’90s when it was THE issue, to now when no one is really talking about the environment?

A: Whenever a movement succeeds, it becomes mainstreamed. When it becomes mainstreamed, it sometimes tends to lose the edge, the fire if you like. And, yes, sometimes it does tend to lose its way. I would say that in Pakistan, it’s become mainstreamed to a great extent, it’s become part of the fabric of most development agendas, particularly civil society. So in that way it has been successful. My own sense is, it needs to reinvent itself by becoming much more a part of the central political process. That would be my way of moving forward. The issue now is how to scale up the solutions we know, which we have tested, and which have succeeded at project level, to application nationwide. And that is something only the political process can do.

Q: What is your take on the economic growth vs poverty debate?

A: The principle of economic growth is not something you could argue with. You have to be able to resource environmental management, and the best way is through a thriving economy. The model of economic growth and its associated consumerism, which is unsustainable, is of course a dilemma. But you certainly need the economic prosperity to be able to fund environmental plans. The question is getting the balance right. Right now, we haven’t got that balance, nor have we got the investment in the right places. I’m sure this is not a very popular opinion because in the west all the environmentalists are beating their breasts that consumerism has gone wild, which I agree. But between that unsustainable model and a kind of Utopia, where you live entirely in a world of sack cloth and ashes, there is a middle path. No country has found it, but you have to strive to get there.

Q: Do we have to reach the extent of the west’s rampant consumerism and unsustainable growth patterns, before we too realise that we’ve destroyed most of our environment, and it’s too late?

A: Absolutely not. That’s the whole point of looking for that middle path. The opportunities that we have in Asia today, enable us to try to find those sustainable models of living without having to destroy everything and then get back to reviving it, as is happening in the west.

Q: What is the big environmental challenge Pakistan faces today, or in the near future?

A: Water. This nation has not begun to realise what a huge challenge the scarcity of water is going to be. Pakistan has no water policy! We are talking about building big dams without any sense of the consequences. What’s happening to the lower riparians? We’re mining water in Balochistan because we cannot put a political policy in place which prices water. If we don’t put the economic instruments in place, we will continue to misuse this resource.

Q: Is the answer, then, privatisation of water?

A: That’s a difficult question. If I were to say yes to that, then I would be accused of ignoring that the poor rely on water as a free resource. But there have been surveys where very poor people were asked if they were willing to pay for water. Their answer was very interesting. They said, “Yes, if we get it.” What people are not willing to do is to pay for something they will not get. Therefore, I think putting an economic value on natural resources and making sure that it is somehow costed into the economics of pricing but, at the same time, buffering the poor from the impact so that they are not driven further into poverty, is necessary.

Q: On another note, what would be an environmentalist’s view of the impact of rains on Karachi’s civic infrastructure?

A: What we do know from climate change is that intensity of weather patterns is going to become more and more dramatic. What cities and countries have to be prepared for is years of drought, or years of floods, and you cannot actually count on what is going to happen anymore. The whole atmosphere is now in such a state of instability. What Karachi should brace itself for, is massive floods. We could even have tsunamis and we are totally unprepared. This is ridiculous because I live in a city like Bangkok which gets monsoonal rains continuously, but has a phenomenally good drainage system. So the problem is not that the knowledge is not there. Our infrastructure is abysmal. And it’s abysmal because of bad governance. Our infrastructure is of poor quality, and there is obviously no accountability. As long as we will not hold our elected representatives accountable for civic services, this will continue.

Q: What have you learned in your two decades of work on the environment?

A: I’ll give you two insights, and these are not particular to the environment movement, but they are useful for anybody who wants to effect socio-economic value change.

The first is, you’ve got to work on the premise that people are basically of good will and want to make things better. Because if you start with a suspicion that people are malafide-intentioned, you will get nowhere. Start with the assumption that you can trust people, and people rise to that expectation.

The second is something that I try and inculcate in all my staff. It is to work on the assumption that if you want something to happen, it will happen. That through sheer bloody-minded persistence, you will wear out all opposition. For the simple reason that most people will not have the patience or the interest in continuing to argue against you, if you are so convinced that something needs to be done. The changes we’ve made, the work we’ve done, the achievements we’ve had, have a lot to do with the conviction that change is possible, that the people you work with are amenable, and will come along, and if you stick to your position — not unintelligently — then eventually you’ll get there.

Q: Let’s talk about your own personal ambitions within the organisation? Is it true that you contested for the top slot in IUCN, but lost?

A: No, I never did. I’ve always been focused on the belief that you grow bottom up. My interest has always been to stay close to the field. I’ve always been interested in making change where you can see it, where you can monitor it, where you can FEEL it. I had lots of opportunities to go abroad while I worked in Pakistan as a country representative, but I always turned them down. It’s been very similar while I’ve been regional director. I want to finish the work in Asia before I move on. I reckon it’ll take me another two years. Then I will move on…to do the last stretch till I retire.

Q: Is there any resentment from countries like India and China in the IUCN regional network to have a director from Pakistan?

A: When I made the transition from country representative in Pakistan to regional director in Asia, I shed the Pakistani persona and became Asian. Of course, I think of myself as a Pakistani national, and this is my home and my country, but I have adopted an Asian persona.

I am today very much an Asian expatriate, but I don’t see myself as an Asian expatriate rather than a Pakistani. The Pakistani national has been enveloped in an Asian persona. Once you have been an expatriate, you cannot come back to your home country without being both on the inside and the outside simultaneously. Without being judgmental, I do try to be analytical, reflective. I discuss with people in the office or even at home, perspectives which I feel they may not appreciate from the outside — a bigger world view, than what is available to somebody who lives in just one place.

Q: How do you see Pakistan now, as an Asian expatriate? Has your view of Pakistan changed? Do you like what you see?

A: I always love coming back home. I always think to myself, there would be so much I can do whenever I come back. So, I always come back with a sense of belonging and a sense of excitement — because Pakistan is on the move. Despite all the bad press, I’ve always had a positive sense of this country. I’ve always felt that these are accidents of history that we have to suffer through, to emerge eventually in some form of nation state which takes its place in the world. With economic indicators changing, you will attract (like India), a lot of expatriate Pakistanis back. They will bring a much wider world view. And this can only be of good to the country. You will find that the private sector will drive a certain openness, a certain tolerance, a certain pushing of change which will be good for the country. As the Indian economy grows, inevitably the whole of South Asia will get pulled out of its current mess.

Q: I’m happy to know that you are actually thinking of retirement; I always thought you were a workaholic who would keep on going!

A: I have another 10 years, age-wise. Then perhaps (I can) go off and do something more indulgent. I think I’d like to write. I did a stint two years ago teaching at Yale. One of the attractions of that semester was the ability to teach, to write, to do research.

Q: Living away from home, how do you make time for family?

A: With a lot of discipline actually. If I’m travelling, I try and get the children to join me. I try and make sure that our paths cross at least every two or three months. We talk a lot on the phone, so we have phenomenal phone bills, but it’s worth it because it keeps us in touch. The children have never expressed any resentment. I can only take, as an indicator, how they are doing in life, and at this point in time I have no complaints.

Q: Does the incessant travelling for work get wearying?

A: Getting on and off planes is an awful waste of time — it’s tiring and stressful, but I always look forward to visiting the city I am going to. I enjoy the work I am going for, I enjoy the work I am doing, therefore if travel is the way to get there, so be it. It’s part of the landscape of the job that I do. It’s a bit like asking an air hostess whether she likes to travel. If I say I don’t like travel, I’m actually saying I don’t like my job!