This brief summarizes a study conducted in the Philippines by Pollnac and Dacanay in 2011, which assessed the benefits of the Integrated Population and Coastal Resource Management (IPOPCORM) project, an integrated population and environment (PE) project implemented by PATH Foundation Philippines Inc.(PFPI)  in the Visayan region of the Philippines.

Madagascar is a region of biologically diverse ecosystems. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) supports integrated population, health, and environment (PHE) programs in eight such countries through Africa and Asia. Through synergies between family planning, human health, and environmental conservation, the PHE approach yields better results in terms of sustainability and efficiency than a single-sector approach. These project countries are areas of rare sensitive landscapes where communities have little access to health services, sanitation, and family planning.

The triple challenge of rapid population growth, declining agricultural productivity, and natural resource degradation are not isolated from one another; they are intimately related. However, strategic planning and development programming tend to focus on individual sectors such as the environment, agriculture, and population; they do not explicitly take into account the compatibilities and inconsistencies among them. Farm households and their livelihood strategies are at the core of the intersectoral linkages approach advocated in this chapter.

Human population growth is one of the primary drivers of biodiversity loss. Throughout much of the developing world growth of human populations is occurring in part as a result of a lack of access to sexual and reproductive health services, and this is having profoundly negative impacts on biodiversity and natural resource-dependent livelihoods.

The purpose of the research presented here is to further evaluate the assumption that the integrated delivery of reproductive health and environmental management practices in one project results in added-value. Value-added is defined as meaning that the integration of the reproductive health and environmental management components will enhance the levels of success of each to the extent that their levels of achievement will be greater than if the projects were delivered separately.

Conservation organizations have integrated family planning into site-based conservation activities in selected countries for almost two decades yet lacked strong evidence of the approach’s value to conservation. Today this approach has come to be known as the integrated “population, health and environment” approach, or “PHE.” Drawing on lessons from early integrated conservation and development projects (known as ICDPs), PHE projects aimed to be more targeted yet still integrated.

This issue of Outlook examines the relationships between family planning and the environment, including key lessons learned from integrated or linked family planning and conservation interventions. The author targets family planning practitioners who are seeking new ways of reframing a fundamental issue - how family planning and the environment relate within the context of well-being and promoting social equity.

This article represents one of few peer-reviewed journal articles on the value added of PHE approaches. The article describes a quasi-experimental design used by the IPOPCORM project in the Philippines to test the hypothesis that there will be a significant improvement in both coastal resource management (CRM) and human reproductive health (RH) outcomes by delivering these services in an integrated manner as opposed to delivering either in isolation. The CRM, RH and integrated CRM+RH interventions were tested in three island municipalities of Palawan.

In February 2010, the USAID-funded BALANCED Project sponsored a South-to-South learning opportunity for government and non-governmental officials to see up close how local stakeholders in the Philippines implement integrated Population, Health and Environment (PHE) approaches there.  Hosted by hosted by PATH Foundation Philippines, Inc. (a BALANCED Project partner), ten developing country representatives from six African and Asian countries spent two weeks visiting three PHE learning sites and a marine protected area in Bohol province, in the central Philippines.

Proponents of integrated development face significant barriers, but the tide may be turning. To fully harness this momentum, Gib Clarke argues that the population-health-environment (PHE) community must solidify its research base, reach out to new partners, and push for flexible funding and programming. In addition, he writes that PHE programs should add livelihoods as a critical element, and consider adopting a new moniker, "HELP"—Health, Environment, Livelihoods, and Population.

Globalization continues to strengthen the interactions among population dynamics, human health, environmental management, economics, and politics. Therefore we must refine our development programs to addresses these complexities. Integrated Population, Health, and Environment (PHE) approaches aim to increase access to family planning and health services, while simultaneously helping communities manage their natural resources in ways that improve their health and livelihoods, and well as conserve critical ecosystems.

This four page fact sheet provides an overview of the challenges facing efforts to promote resilient communities, and provides examples of how USAID is contributing to address them. Experience shows that long-term conservation cannot be guaranteed unless local communities are thriving. USAID believes that maintaining the balance between people and the environment requires an integrated approach, with activities focused on family planning, food security, basic health, nutrition, income generation, conservation, disease prevention, and access to safe water and sanitation.

Several conservation organizations have started integrating health and family planning into conservation projects. This integration has multiple benefits. Often conservation practitioners recognize the potential value of integrated PHE (population-health-environment) projects but need guidance on how to effectively incorporate P and H components into their project or on how to create a PHE project from scratch. This manual was created as a resource for these practitioners. It reviews not only the how, but also the why and what of PHE projects.

This assessment examines 11 field projects and 45 field sites, evaluating the “first generation” of Population and Environment (PE) and Population Health Environment (PHE) field projects.

For over a decade community-based projects linking family planning, health, and environment efforts have been active in Fianarantsoa province, Madagascar. Explored in this brief is the evolution of cross-sectoral approaches and projects in Fianarantsoa province. The early cross-sectoral initiatives recognized that conservation and management of natural resources could be undermined by high fertility rates, and that addressing health needs would lead to a connection between communities and development practitioners.

The earth’s ecosystems and its human populations are inherently connected. This connection has been recognized by conservation groups, governments, and international organizations now using integrated interventions in the world’s biodiversity hotspots. These new approaches integrate family planning and conservation activities in community-based projects. This brief document discusses where we have taken integrated population-health-environment (PHE) approaches, what we haven’t yet accomplished with these approaches, and where we should move from here.

Environmental problems are increasingly understood to play an important role in increasing human vulnerability, undermining livelihoods and human wellbeing, creating instability, and potentially generating or exacerbating violent conflict. Although environmental change threatens all of humanity, people living in the developing world are often most vulnerable to its effects, as large portions of these populations are directly dependent on local resources for survival.

This report summarizes a study of 31 health and conservation projects, documenting examples in which community-based health has been used as motivation to conserve biodiversity.