Description:
A study of households (rich and poor) in the Masvingo Province in southeastern Zimbabwe provides a good example of how agricultural income complements wild income and how it compares with other income sources such as wages and remittances. Agricultural income—from crops and home gardens—contributed 30 percent of total household income (cash and subsistence income combined). Livestock rearing—a modified form of agriculture that relies on wild forage—contributed another 21 percent. Wild products from woodlands contributed 15 percent. Together, these elements of environmental income sum to 66 percent of total income. In other words, goods and services from ecosystems contribute twothirds of family incomes in rural Zimbabwe. The remaining 34 percent came from wage labor, income from home industries, and remittances. For the poorest of these rural households, dependence on these different kinds of environmental income is even higher, providing a full 70 percent of total income when combined.