Rural Access Programme

Fact Sheet

Environment

The Rural Access Programme and the Environment

The Rural Access Programme seeks to improve the socio-economic environment for all people, but especially poor and disadvantaged groups, in the target hill areas of Nepal where it works. Ideally all of the programme’s activities would be beneficial both to people’s livelihoods and for the environment in general, but there is a danger of negative impacts occurring. The RAP approach therefore aims to:

contribute as far as possible to a better environment, in terms of both its bio-physical and socio-economic conditions;
help the communities in the target areas to gain the maximum environmental benefits from the activities supported by the programme; and
find ways of avoiding or mitigating the negative impacts of programme activities on the environment.

What is the Environment?

The environment is everything around us. It includes our surroundings, such as the physical and biological conditions of the areas where we live. It also includes the social, religious, cultural, and economic situations that determine who we are, what we do, and what are our customs and values.

But the environment is more than what we see and how we behave. It also involves the conditions in which we live and in which development occurs. These include the political and economic factors that shape our society and control how we can respond. They are the invisible factors that determine what people do to improve their livelihoods and living conditions.

Environmental benefits of RAP activities

RAP is involved in the improvement of people’s livelihoods through better access to the goods, services and markets that they value. These are all environmental benefits. Since most of RAP’s work is centred on road construction and social development activities associated with them, this fact sheet concentrates on the benefits and disadvantages likely in connection with roads.

During construction, a large number of poor and dis-advantaged people will be employed and will have the immediate benefit of income from construction activities. Other local people will have opportunities to increase income through service-based economic activities such as teashops, small hotels, kiosks, etc. Many of those involved in construction will be able to enhance their technical skills, for example in construction methods and masonry. Once road construction is complete, the following benefits should come.

Roads will raise the mobility of people; trade in the area will be increased and the prices of goods will be decreased.
Markets will be accessed and local resources can be developed more easily.
The cultivation of higher value crops will be increased due to better access to markets.
Small scale agro-industries and other cottage industries will be promoted.
The value of land will increase in the road corridors.
With better access to the outside world, local people will have more exposure to the advantages of changed lifestyles.

Environmental disadvantages

Unfortunately, experience in Nepal has shown that the benefits described above are often accompanied by a number of adverse impacts. These are partly a result of the fragile physical environment of the southern Himalayas, where some damage is unavoidable in the development of any form of infrastructure; but in the past much damage has also resulted from careless planning and rapid engineering works.

The main areas of visible environmental damage by roads have been on the bio-physical environment. These include problems of slope stability, spoil disposal and water management, and protection of vegetative cover. Less visible effects have occurred which detract from the social environment: the chief among these is the safety of road users and the introduction of bad habits. However, the low traffic volume of most roads has avoided damaging levels of air and noise pollution, disruption to wildlife and other impacts commonly associated with roads in industrialised countries.

The mitigation of environmental problems

“Mitigation” simply means reducing the severity of undesirable impacts. RAP will use mitigation measures to reduce the negative environmental impacts. Typical measures are as follows.

Various types of location-specific soil erosion and landslide protection measures. These will include substantial use of bio-engineering measures.
Awareness-raising among communities of the long-term consequences of environmental mis-management.
Work with district authorities to ensure timely road maintenance and rehabilitation works.
Improved local planning for roadside settlements and land use.
Support to local communities and user groups for managing forests.

Beyond mitigation, RAP is working to maximise the benefits for people in the road corridors. This is being done mostly through the programme’s enhancing and protecting interventions (EPIs).

Assessing environmental impacts

RAP will use standard procedures for environmental appraisal, as shown in the table below.

Environmental activity	Purpose
District Environmental Brief	A profile of environmental conditions in each RAP district.
Initial Environmental Examination	The first level of environmental study, required for all district roads, and for other types of programme works, such as major bridges.
Environmental Impact Assessment	A full, in-depth study of potential impacts, carried out if an IEE finds that impacts might be significant. Also required for feeder roads.
Environmental Management Plans and Environmental Monitoring	The process of making sure that recommendations from environmental studies are applied in practice, both during the project and afterwards.

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