Explaining the persistence of low income and environmentally degrading land uses in the Brazilian Amazon
Explaining the persistence of low income and environmentally degrading land uses in the Brazilian Amazon
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DOI：
10.5751/es-09364-220327
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发表时间：
2017-01-01
影响因子：
4.1
通讯作者：
Parry, Luke
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Garrett, Rachael D.;Gardner, Toby A.;Parry, Luke
热带森林继续受到森林砍伐和农村贫困的双重可持续性挑战的困扰。我们试图理解为什么生活在巴西亚马逊地区（世界上最大的热带农林业边界所在地）的许多农民坚持从事与低收入和高环境破坏相关的农业活动。为了回答这个问题，我们评估了影响这些前沿地区农业活动发展和分布以及农民福利的因素。我们的研究利用了巴西亚马逊东部两个地区独特的综合社会生态数据集，并采用了一个新颖的概念框架，突出了家庭属性、农业活动和福祉之间的相互依赖关系。我们发现，畜牧生产（每公顷收入最低）仍然是偏远地区最普遍的土地利用方式，但许多高收入的水果、园艺和主要作物生产的例子都存在于小块土地上，特别是在城郊地区。由于供应链基础设施滞后、社会偏好以及与土地使用活动相关的收入不是感知生活质量的主要来源，向更有利可图的土地使用的过渡受到了限制。相反，主观幸福感更严重地受到农村生活方式的非金钱属性（安全、宁静、社区关系等）的影响。我们的结论是，在巴西亚马逊地区的农林边界，从低收入土地利用的转型不需要放弃以土地为中心的发展愿景，但需要制定政策和计划，根据比传统应用的更广泛的家庭资产、文化属性和愿望来识别和区分家庭。在更广泛的范围内，必须通过对加工、储存和销售基础设施的投资来改善高价值作物进入遥远市场的机会。
Tropical forests continue to be plagued by the dual sustainability challenges of deforestation and rural poverty. We seek to understand why many of the farmers living in the Brazilian Amazon, home to the world's largest tropical agricultural-forest frontier, persist in agricultural activities associated with low incomes and high environmental damage. To answer this question, we assess the factors that shape the development and distribution of agricultural activities and farmer well-being in these frontiers. Our study utilizes a uniquely comprehensive social-ecological dataset from two regions in the eastern Brazilian Amazon and employs a novel conceptual framework that highlights the interdependencies between household attributes, agricultural activities, and well-being. We find that livestock production, which yields the lowest per hectare incomes, remains the most prevalent land use in remote areas, but many examples of high income fruit, horticulture, and staple crop production exist on small properties, particularly in peri-urban areas. The transition to more profitable land uses is limited by lagging supply chain infrastructure, social preferences, and the fact that income associated with land use activities is not a primary source of perceived life quality. Instead subjective well-being is more heavily influenced by the nonmonetary attributes of a rural lifestyle (safety, tranquility, community relations, etc.). We conclude that transitions away from low-income land uses in agricultural-forest frontiers of the Brazilian Amazon need not abandon a land-focused vision of development, but will require policies and programs that identify and discriminate households based on a broader set of household assets, cultural attributes, and aspirations than are traditionally applied. At a broader scale, access to distant markets for high value crops must be improved via investments in processing, storage, and marketing infrastructure.