where large scale infrastructure has been built. Dams have fragmented and transformed the world's rivers, displacing 40-80 million people in different parts of the world (WCD, 2000). Criteria for land allocation do not necessarily guarantee a place in the irrigated schemes for those who have lost their land and resettlement can result in impoverishment (Cernea, 1999).

Access to energy provides important livelihood benefits and improves opportunities to benefit from AKST.

Energy is an essential resource for economic development (DFID, 2002), but more than 1.5 billion people are without access to electricity. In developing countries, approximately 44% of rural and 15% of urban households do not have access to electricity, while in sub-Sahara Africa, these figures increase to 92% and 42% respectively (IEA, 2006c). There is a direct correlation between a country's per capita energy consumption (and access) and its industrial progress, economic growth and Human Development Index (UNDP, 2006a). Estimates of the financial benefits arising from access to electricity for rural households in the Philippines were between $81 and $150 per month, largely due to the improved returns on education and opportunity costs from time saved, lower cost of lighting, and improved productivity (UNDP/ESMAP, 2002a). Affordable and reliable rural energy is important in stimulating agricultural related enterprises (Fitzgerald et al., 1990). However, rapid electrification, without the necessary support structures to ensure effectiveness and sustainability, does not bring benefits. Decentralized approaches to electricity provision delivered by private sector, NGOs or community based organizations are presenting viable alternatives that can improve access for rural households.

Improved utilization of biomass energy sources and alternative clean fuels for cooking can benefit livelihoods, especially for women and children.

More than 2.5 billion people use biomass such as fuel wood, charcoal, crop waste and animal dung as their main source of energy for cooking. Biomass accounts for 90% of household energy consumption in many developing countries (IEA, 2006c). Smoke produced from the burning of biomass using simple cooking stoves without adequate ventilation, can lead to serious environmental health problems (Ezzati and Kammen, 2002; Smith, 2006), particularly for women and children (Dasgupta et al., 2004). Women and children are most often responsible for fuel collection, an activity with competes significantly with time for other activities, including agriculture (e.g., 37 hours per household per month in one study in rural India) (UNDP/ESMAP, 2002b). Simple interventions such as improved stoves can reduce biomass consumption by more than 50% and can reduce the effects of indoor smoke (Baris et al., 2006).

The successful achievement of development goals is greatest when social and local organizational development is a key component of technology development and dissemination and when resource poor farmers are involved in problem-solving.

The social and cultural components of natural resource use and agricultural decision making are fundamental influences on the outcomes from AKST. They operate both at the level of individual actors and decision makers, and at group or community level. Community based approaches have had important results in promoting social cohesion; enhancing governance by building consensus among multiple stakeholders for action around problem issues; and facilitating community groups to influence policy makers (Sanginga et al., 2007). Community based, collective resource management groups that build trust and social capital increasingly common (Scoones and Thompson, 1994; Agrawal and Gibson, 1999; Pretty, 2003). Since the early 1990s, about 0.4- 0.5 million local resource management groups have been established. In the US, hundreds of grassroots rural ecosystem place-based management groups have been described as a new environmental movement (Campbell, 1994), enhancing the governance of "the commons" and investment confidence (Pretty, 2003). They have been effective in improving the management of watersheds, forests, irrigation, pests, wildlife conservation, fisheries, micro-finance and farmer's research. In conservation programs, however, there are sometimes negative impacts from social capital; the social exclusion of certain groups or categories or the manipulation of associations by individuals with self-interest (Olivier de Sardan, 1995; Pretty, 2003). When promoting community participation and decision making, it is important to set in place mechanisms to ensure the participation of the most vulnerable or socially excluded groups such as women, the poorest, or those living in remote areas, to ensure their voices are heard and their rights protected (see 3.2.3.3).

Initiatives to enhance social sustainability are strengthened if accompanied by policies that ensure the poorest can participate.

Poor people in the community are empowered by programs that build or transfer assets and develop human capital (health care, literacy and employment-particularly in offfarm enterprises) (IDS, 2006; UNDP, 2006b). The alternative and more costly scenario is the mitigation of livelihood and natural resource failure in poor rural areas, through long-term welfare support and emergency relief (Dorward et al., 2004).

3.2.3.2.4 Vulnerability and risk

Although AKST has had many positive impacts, it is now clear that in some circumstances it has also been a strong