THINKING beyond the canopy

Land tenure and land use changeLand tenure and land use change

Pablo PachecoCIFOR, Annual Meeting 2012October – Bogor, Indonesia

THINKING beyond the canopy

Main issues on debate

Which actor holds the right to the land is goingto determine how the resources will be used

Changes in tenure structures (or regimes) tendto influence on landscape change as result ofland-use associated economic processes

For effective policy responses is important notonly to know more in-depth how tenure changetakes place but also where that change occurs

THINKING beyond the canopy

Tenure change and deforestation:Reconstructing land tenure change over time

Pacheco (2009) Environment and History 15(4):493-520

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

1986 1992 1996 2000 2002

Smallholders Medium and large ranchers No identified

Contribution of agents byperiod in %

0%

3%

6%

9%

12%

1986-92 1992-96 1996-00 2000-02

Smallholders Medium and large ranchers No identified

Annual rates of deforestationby agent in %

How previous decisions on landdistribution affect contemporary landtenure configurations? what are theirmain land-use impacts?

Redenção area: Land tenure change

Mosaic for land allocationand SUDAM projects

THINKING beyond the canopy

Land distribution and deforestation:Linking agricultural census and remote sensing data

Actor type derived from IBGE AgriculturalCensus 1995/96. It shows the dominance ofeither smallholders (< 100 ha), medium-scalelandholders (100 to 1,000 ha), or largeholders(> 1,000 ha). That information was overlaidwith INPE deforestation data by 2003.

Deforestation data obtained from INPE by 2003

Pacheco (2009) World Development 37(8):1337-1347

What are the interactions between state-led land reform and land-use changetaking place in the Brazilian Amazon?

The implications are heterogeneous since are relatedto the pre-existing social and economic configurationof the frontiers where land distribution takes place.

THINKING beyond the canopy

Tenure and economic change:Looking at two points of time based on census data

What are the main tenure change dynamicstaking place—at a regional scale –and how arethey related to land-use decision making?

Two simultaneous processes of extensification andintensification. These trends of change are associated toconcentration and fragmentation of landholdings

Pacheco and Poccard-Chapuis (2012). Annals of the AAG 102(6)

THINKING beyond the canopy

What are the land use dynamics related todifferent actor and frontier types in theagricultural frontiers in Brazilian Amazon?

There is a greater accumulated deforestation inlandscapes that are dominated by large-scalelandholders but deforestation intensity is growing inthose where smallholders are the predominant actor.

Actor and frontier types:Implications from differential interactions

Pacheco (2012). GeoForum.43(4): 864–874,

Land use in the BLA (2006)

AC

TOR

TYP

E

FRONTIER TYPE

Agricultural GDP per unit ofland by frontier type

HDI in 2000 by frontier type

THINKING beyond the canopy

Land distribution at national level:Looking at tenure at the property / territorial unit level

What is the emerging tenure structure fromland regularization in a context of competingrights claims among diverse social actors?

Pacheco and Benatti (in preparation)

State of Para, Brazil

Lowland Bolivia

Tenure typeThousand hectares In percents

Para LowlandBolivia

Para LowlandBolivia

Smallholders 27,329 6,479 22.4 7.8Medium- and large-scalelandholders 34,023 22,998 27.9 27.7Community lands 8,091 5,973 6.6 7.2Indigenous territories 27,368 13,424 22.5 16.2Public land identified 24,954 15,534 20.5 18.7Forest concessions 4,409 - 5.3Protected areas 14,096 - 17.0TOTAL 121,764 82,912 100.0 100.0

Land distribution in Para and lowland Bolivia

Temporal variation in land-cover change byactor type in lowland Bolivia

THINKING beyond the canopy

Potential and limitations

Outcomes depend on spatial and temporal resolutionof socio-economic and remote sensing data

Increasing availability of more disaggregated dataover time makes able to produce more accurateassessment of tenure configurations and LUC

Census data provides a good understanding of landtenure configurations, and associated processesrelated to land privatization and commoditization

Census or remote sensing data requires to becomplemented with analysis of social arrangementsand bundles of rights associated to land tenure