Population-environment interface in Botswana: Issues, challenges and prospects

This chapter examines interrelationships between population and environment in Botswana. It reviews the impact of population growth on the environment and the prospects for mitigating these impacts through government policies and programmes. The chapter suggests that rapid population increase negatively affects the environment and proper policy and programme measures are required to address these negative impacts. There is no simple correlation between population and environment as population, environment and development interact in many complex ways. Human populations require resources for their survival and the environment is the primary source of these resources. Botswana’s population continues to increase and this has placed more demand on the use of natural resources. Development encompasses use and conservation of the environment in which human population resides. It considers issues of economic growth, distribution of wealth, poverty alleviation and human welfare. The concept of population density is usually used to measure the relationship between population and resources, particularly land.