Documenting the transition to plantation agriculture: Long term and comparative study of ecological change and human impacts

由于全球对农业初级商品的需求上升，大片土地继续从小农户的自给作物生产转为以种植园为基础的高回报作物生产，如可可、棕榈油、木薯、桉树和橡胶。批评人士声称，这种转变代表了一个圈地的新时代，构成了一种“全球土地掠夺”，对社会公平和环境可持续发展产生了负面影响。倡导者承认这些变化的影响，但他们反过来辩称，农业商品生产代表着许多发展中国家对资源基础的最有效利用，也是他们实现经济现代化的最大希望。试图了解这些变化对农村人民的影响的社会科学家也同样存在分歧。许多研究集中在伴随着土地损失和从混合自给自足经济向依赖受雇劳动力的转变的经济边缘化。然而，一些研究人员已经证明，随着农村居民更多地融入全国市场，各种幸福感指标实际上都有所改善。这一奖项支持了关于农业转产和结构调整对当地人有利还是不利的科学研究。因为这一过程发生在世界各地，包括在美国，它已经持续了一个多世纪，重要的是更好地了解其后果。这项研究将把柬埔寨作为一个可管理和适当的测试案例；在那里，小农已经失去了他们的传统资源基础，被降级到新围栏边缘的中间空间。夏威夷大学马诺亚分校的乔纳森·帕德韦博士将对一系列高原村庄的土地利用模式和福祉进行调查。他将收集数据，为辩论双方提供信息：对土地持有、资源使用和社会分化的精细研究，以及关于营养、福祉和家庭经济的数据。这项研究将对新土地制度的影响进行共时和历时测量。同步分析涉及对一系列村庄的土地使用和福祉的研究，从直接受影响的村庄到间接受影响的村庄。历时分析涉及对单个村庄的土地使用和福祉进行比较研究，其中有十年的纵向数据。这项研究的结果将有助于我们理解人类规模向种植园商品生产过渡的影响，为在一个具有全球重要性的问题上的理论辩论和发展政策提供信息。

Because of the rise in global demand for agricultural commodities, large land areas continue to be converted from smallholder subsistence crop production to plantation-based production of highly remunerative immediate-return crops, such as cacao, palm oil, cassava, eucalyptus and rubber. Critics claim that this transformation represents a new era of enclosures and constitutes a "global land grab," which has negative effects on social equity and environmental sustainability. Advocates acknowledge the impacts of the changes but argue in turn that agricultural commodity production represents the most efficient use of the resource base in many developing countries, and their best hope for economic modernization. Social scientists who seek to understand the impacts of these transformations on rural people have likewise been divided. Many studies have focused on the economic marginalization that accompanies loss of land and the transition from mixed subsistence economies to dependence on wage labor. Yet some researchers have demonstrated that various indicators of well-being in fact improve as rural residents become more integrated with national markets. This award supports scientific research on this debate: Is agricultural conversion and restructuring good for local people or not? Because this process occurs throughout the world, including in the United States where it has been ongoing for over a century, it is important to have a better understanding of its consequences. The research will use Cambodia as a manageable and appropriate test case; there, smallholder farmers have lost their traditional resource base and have been relegated to the in-between spaces at the edges of the new enclosures. Dr. Jonathan Padwe (University of Hawai'i at Mânoa) will survey land-use patterns and well-being across a series of highland villages. He will collect data to inform both sides of the debate: fine-scaled study of land-holding, resource use, and social differentiation as well as data on nutrition, well-being, and household economy. The study will make synchronic and diachronic measurements of the impact of new land regimes. Synchronic analysis involves the study of land use and well-being across a range of villages, from those that are directly affected to those that are indirectly affected. Diachronic analysis involves the comparative study of land use and well-being in a single village where ten-year longitudinal data are available. Findings from this research will contribute to our understanding of the impacts of the transition to plantation-based commodity production at a human scale, informing both theoretical debates and development policy on an issue of global importance.