Land-use and Threats to Parks in the Neotropics

Abstract

The ecological consequences of contemporary land-use in the neotropics have important influences on national park management in the region. Historical patterns suggest that major land-use changes have occurred regularly, and that these patterns have recently intensified. Is there a relationship between specific land-uses and specific threats to protected areas? Can this relationship be detected in a population of parks?In a survey of managers of 183 national parks, 122 returned questionnaires from 19 countries in the neotropics. We found that a range of land-uses, from livestock grazing to quarrying, are occurring in and around the parks. The results of our statistical analysis indicate that many of these activities are associated with specific threats to park resources: for example, poaching for subsistence was statistically associated with each of the ten most-reported threats.We offer two suggestions for improving our understanding of environmental degradation within parks. First, that research and park management be expanded to acquire a regional focus, namely that the land-transforming activities which threaten park resources can best be understood by incorporating the regional-social and political-economic contexts in the analysis. Second, that the influences of the global economic system be increasingly considered in conceptual frameworks of conservation biology.