Abstract ID: 512

Modelling deforestation and its intraregional interactions in the Brazilian Amazon: market pressure versus public policies

The Brazilian Amazonia rain forest is a largely heterogeneous region, in which coexist subregions with different rates of change, due to the diversity of ecological, socio-economic, political and accessibility conditions. Due to the intense human occupation in the last decades, about 17% of the original forest has been cleared. Deforestation rates had increased from 2001 to 2004 from 18,165 km2 to 27,970 km2. In 2005, the estimated rate dropped to 18,900 km2, and in 2007 to 11,224km2. The lower rates since 2005 have been associated to control actions conducted by the Brazilian government, including law enforcement actions and the creation of protected areas, and partly to lower commodities prices in the international market. The goal of this work is to analyze the intra-regional distribution of these deforestation rates exploring two axes of hypothesis: (A) Our first hypothesis is that the current hot-spots of deforestation contributed differently to these rates fluctuation, as they responded to market and policy conditions according to their specific socio-economic context; (B) Our second hypothesis regards intra-regional interactions. Recent evidence points out that localized deforestation control policies applied to one municipality, such as the creation of protected areas or localized law enforcement actions, might stimulate the occupation of other areas in the medium and long run. Such intraregional interactions result from processes that act on different hierarchical levels. At the global scale, the national and international commodities market (beef, grains and timber) drives demand for land change. At the local scale, different actors operate in their specific socio-economic and biophysical contexts, creating different land-use trajectories. So our second hypothesis is the existence of such intra-regional multi-scale interactions. We will create a spatial database with indicators of land change that act on different scales to be able to understand and quantify these intraregional differences (hypothesis A) and interactions (hypothesis B) using spatial and statistical analysis methods. We expect to enhance the knowledge about the last decade deforestation rates fluctuation exploring these two axes of hypotheses. There is an expectation rates may start to rise again in the period 2008-2010, due to rise in the commodities prices and the expansion of biofuels. Our work may also contribute to subside the formulation of policies to control new booms of deforestation in the future, considering the balance of the market pressure over the territory and proper policy actions at several levels.

Session:  LCLUC and Human Dimensions - Land-use/land-cover change models and scenarios at multiple scales for Amazonia.

Presentation Type:  Oral