SPACE, TIME AND SUSTAINABILITY IN THE HADEJIA-JAMAARE WETLANDS AND THE KOMODUGU-YOBE BASIN, NIGERIA

Debates about sustainability still take insufficient account of the si gnificance of space and time. In this payer, their significance is dem onstrated empirically through an account of the complex environmental and socio-economic impacts of dam construction on flood-plain wetlands in the Hadejia-Jama' are river basin in Nigeria. Socio-economic data from a rapid rural appraisal exercise and household questionnaire surv ey (data on patterns of production in the flood plain and patterns of mobility) are appraised in the context of patterns of environmental ch ange and of inundation (analysis of riparian vegetation and time-serie s aerial photographs). The paper concludes that sustainable river basi n development requires more attention to be paid to the perspectives d erived from different scales of analysis. This calls for appropriate i nstitutions allowing communication at the interface between village-le vel producer and river basin manager.