ABSTRACT
Natural resources play a critical role in our lives, providing us with, for example, food, shelter and energy. For more than 1.3 billion people around the world, natural resources in the form of fisheries, forests and agriculture provide close to half of all jobs worldwide, with rural people, in particular, directly depending on natural capital compared to other parts of the population. In Africa, more than seven in ten poor people live in rural regions, and most are engaged in resource-dependent activities such as subsistence farming, livestock production, fishing, hunting, artisanal mining and logging. In these areas, natural resources provide the primary sources of income (financial and otherwise), but also the safety nets when crops fail, droughts hit and employment opportunities are few and far between.
