Analysis of socioeconomic and environmental sensitivity of sugarcane cultivation using a Geographic Information System

Pedro Gerber Machado, Núria A. Miatto Rampazo, Michelle Cristina Araujo Picoli, Cauã Guilherme Miranda, Daniel Garbellini Duft and Katia Regina Evaristo de Jesus

Land Use Policy, 2017, vol. 69, issue C, 64-74

Abstract: The global interest in biofuels has increased significantly in recent years, mainly due to the concern about climate change. In Brazil, the land area under sugarcane cultivation has expanded in unprecedented ways to meet the increasing ethanol demand of both the domestic and international markets. São Paulo is the Brazilian state with the highest production of sugarcane, and the expansion of this activity can impact both the environment and society. The purpose of this paper was to assess and map the sensitivity of the areas used for sugarcane cultivation in São Paulo state and to provide a holistic approach to sugarcane production from the sustainability perspective by integrating indicators of the environmental, social and economic spheres without focusing on one single element. Five environmental indicators (related to water resources, slope, environmental conservation areas, land use and agricultural potential) and six socioeconomic indicators (related to employment, income, education, gender equality, child labor and forced labor) were selected for the analysis. The methodology comprised the Categorical Principal Components Analysis (CATPCA) technique and the spatialization of results in a Geographic Information System. The resulting maps of sensitivity show the patterns of the three retained principal components and provide an information-rich tool that the government can use in decision making, policy formulation and the integrated planning of land use, thereby enabling the identification of both hotspots and which issues should be prioritized.

Keywords: CATPCA; Sugarcane; Brazil; Sustainability indicators (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264837716303040
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:lauspo:v:69:y:2017:i:c:p:64-74

DOI: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2017.08.039

Access Statistics for this article

Land Use Policy is currently edited by Jaap Zevenbergen

More articles in Land Use Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joice Jiang ().