Coca and Colonists: Quantifying and Explaining Forest Clearance under Coca and Anti-Narcotics Policy Regimes

Bradley, Andrew V.; Millington, Andrew C.. 2008 Coca and Colonists: Quantifying and Explaining Forest Clearance under Coca and Anti-Narcotics Policy Regimes. Ecology and Society, 13 (1), 31. 31.

Full text not available from this repository.

Official URL: http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/iss1/art31

Abstract/Summary

The impacts of coca cultivation and coca eradication on rates of humid tropical forest clearance were examined in the agricultural colonization zone of Chapare, Bolivia. Using satellite image-derived land-use maps, interviews with farmers, and analyses of economic data and policy documents, forest clearance rates were analyzed in three contrasting communities from 1963 to 2003. Deforestation rates were very low from the late 1970s to the early 1990s when coca cultivation was widespread and anti-coca policies were weakly enforced. Before and after this period, deforestation rates were significantly higher. This study provides the first detailed quantitative analysis of deforestation rates under different policy regimes in a coca source region. It provides weak support for the argument that labor constraints lead to a reduction in forest clearance rates during periods of coca cultivation advanced by Kaimowitz (1997); but stronger support for Henkel’s (1995) hypothesis that farmers would clear large areas of forest after abandoning coca to maintain household incomes. However, economic arguments based on household data alone are inadequate in explaining forest clearance in this region, and a political ecological approach that analyses economic drivers in a policy framework provides better explains deforestation dynamics.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Programmes:	CEH Programmes pre-2009 publications > Biodiversity
UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:	Parr
ISSN:	1708-3087
Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:	Ecology and Society is an Open Access Journal
Additional Keywords:	anti-narcotics policies, Bolivia, coca, deforestation, forest clearance rates, land-use change
NORA Subject Terms:	Ecology and Environment
Date made live:	03 Mar 2009 14:44 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/6376

Item Type:

Publication - Article

Programmes:

CEH Programmes pre-2009 publications > Biodiversity

UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:

Parr

ISSN:

1708-3087

Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:

Ecology and Society is an Open Access Journal

Additional Keywords:

anti-narcotics policies, Bolivia, coca, deforestation, forest clearance rates, land-use change