Doctoral Dissertation Research: Settlement Formation and Land Use and Land Cover Change: a case study in the Brazilian Amazon

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Land reform in Brazil has moved into the reaches of the Amazon, and concerns about poverty and the environment have merged in colonization areas throughout the basin. Research addressing the causes of Amazonian deforestation, to which the proposed project seeks to contribute, has implicated many factors, ranging from the role of markets in the south of Brazil to the size of individual farming households. Much remains to be learned, however, about the impact of agrarian reform on this massive process of environmental degradation. The proposed research seeks to comprehend land cover and land use change in Amazonia by direct reference to the underlying social and institutional circumstances that have contributed to a source of deforestation in the Amazon basin that has grown in significance in recent years, and shows no signs of abating. Specifically, poor farmers, who have grown disillusioned with the Brazilian government's promise of land redistribution, have taken it upon themselves to form settlements, or assentamentos. The proposed research addresses a particular type of settlement presently affecting the most vulnerable parts of the Amazon forest, which is found on terra devoluta. The goal of the proposed research is to comprehend the social processes leading to spontaneously-formed assentamentos, and also to assess associated impacts on Amazonian deforestation. This entails two specific objectives, namely to (1) undertake a case study of a newly formed assentamento where we have already identified a number of key informants, and to (2) conduct a remote sensing analysis of deforestation occurring in this assentamento and others like it, found in the region. Thus, this project seeks to ascertain the effects of spontaneous settlement on deforestation in the Amazon basin. The academic merit of the project research is that it (1) will reveal the underlying causes of spontaneous settlement formation, and it (2) will measure the extent to which such settlements function as a proximate cause of deforestation. In other words, the research will contribute to the literature on land reform in Brazil at the same time it sheds light on Amazonian deforestation. In addition, this research will have a broader and significant pratical impact for the policy community concerned with loss of the Amazon forest, land reform, and with the provision of a life of dignity for the rural poor.