Integrating Forest Cover Change with Census Data: Drivers and Contexts from Bolivia and the Lao PDR

Sébastien Boillat, Hy Dao, Patrick Bottazzi, Yuri Sandoval, Abraham Luna, Sithong Thongmanivong, Louca Lerch, Joan Bastide, Andreas Heinimann and Frédéric Giraut
Additional contact information
Sébastien Boillat: Department of Geography and Environment, University of Geneva, Uni Mail, 40 Bd du Pont-dʼArve, Genève 4, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland
Hy Dao: Department of Geography and Environment, University of Geneva, Uni Mail, 40 Bd du Pont-dʼArve, Genève 4, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland
Patrick Bottazzi: Institut de Géographie et Durabilité, University of Lausanne, Mouline—Géopolis, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
Yuri Sandoval: Instituto de Investigaciones Geográficas, Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, Cota Cota, Calle 27 La Paz, Bolivia
Abraham Luna: Instituto de Investigaciones Geográficas, Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, Cota Cota, Calle 27 La Paz, Bolivia
Sithong Thongmanivong: Faculty of Forestry, National University of Laos, Dongdok, Xaythany District, Vientiane, Laos
Louca Lerch: Department of Geography and Environment, University of Geneva, Uni Mail, 40 Bd du Pont-dʼArve, Genève 4, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland
Joan Bastide: Department of Geography and Environment, University of Geneva, Uni Mail, 40 Bd du Pont-dʼArve, Genève 4, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland
Andreas Heinimann: Centre for Development and Environnment & Institute of Geography, University of Bern, Hallerstrasse 10, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland
Frédéric Giraut: Department of Geography and Environment, University of Geneva, Uni Mail, 40 Bd du Pont-dʼArve, Genève 4, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland

Land, 2015, vol. 4, issue 1, 1-38

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to explore possible links between forest cover change and characteristics of social-ecological systems at sub-national scale based mainly on census data. We assessed relationships between population density, poverty, ethnicity, accessibility and forest cover change during the last decade for four regions of Bolivia and the Lao PDR, combining a parcel-based with a cell-based approach. We found that accessibility is a key driver of forest cover change, yet it has the effect of intensifying other economic and policy-related underlying drivers, like colonization policies, cash crop demand, but also policies that lead to forest gain in one case. Poverty does not appear as a driver of deforestation, but the co-occurrence of poverty and forest loss driven by external investments appears critical in terms of social-ecological development. Ethnicity was found to be a moderate explanatory of forest cover change, but appears as a cluster of converging socio-economic characteristics related with settlement history and land resource access. The identification of such clusters can help ordering communities into a typology of social-ecological systems, and discussing their possible outcomes in light of a critical view on forest transition theory, as well as the relevance and predictive power of the variables assessed. Résumé: L’objectif de cet article est d’explorer les liens entre le changement de la couverture forestière et les caractéristiques des systèmes socio-écologiques à l’échelle nationale, principalement à l’aide de données de recensement. Nous avons évalué les relations entre la densité de population, la pauvreté, l’ethnicité, l’accessibilité et le changement de la couverture forestière pendant la dernière décennie pour quatre régions de Bolivie et du Laos, en combinant des approches par parcelles et par cellules. Nous avons constaté que l’accessibilité est un facteur clé du changement de la couverture forestière, tandis qu’elle a pour effet d'intensifier d'autres facteurs économiques et politiques sous-jacents, comme les politiques de colonisation, la demande de cultures de rente, mais aussi, dans un cas, des politiques conduisant à un accroissement de la forêt. La pauvreté n’apparait pas comme un facteur de déforestation, mais la co-occurrence de la pauvreté et de la perte de forêt entrainée par les investissements extérieurs semble critique en termes de développement socio-écologique. L'ethnicité se révèle être modérément explicative du changement de la couverture forestière, mais elle apparait comme un ensemble de caractéristiques socio-économiques convergentes liées à l'histoire de l’implantation humaine et à l'accès aux ressources foncières. L'identification de tels ensembles peut aider à classer les communautés selon une typologie des systèmes socio-écologiques, et à discuter leurs possibles impacts sur la forêt avec un point de vue critique sur la théorie de la transition forestière, ainsi que la pertinence et la puissance prédictive des variables évaluées.

Keywords: forest cover change; deforestation; integrative land change science; social-ecological systems; meso-scale; forest transitions; rural poverty; Bolivia; Laos (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/4/1/45/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/4/1/45/ (text/html)

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:gam:jlands:v:4:y:2015:i:1:p:45-82:d:44946

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().