Where money grows on trees: A socio-ecological assessment of land use change in an agricultural frontier

Abstract

Integrating social or cultural data into ecological models is critical for understanding complex social-ecological systems. In this study, we used an interdisciplinary approach to identify, assess, and contextualize possible drivers of farmer decisions to use land for cannabis production and development shortly after adult use of cannabis was legalized in Josephine County, Oregon. First, we interviewed 14 cannabis farmers about their relationship with the land, their land use decision making process, and reflections on the local industry. Second, we identified recurring responses in farmer interviews that highlighted perceived social and geographic drivers of cannabis land use distribution and change. Finally, we quantified these drivers as spatial covariates and evaluated their value as predictors in three models: 1) logistic regression of cannabis land use distribution post legalization (2016); 2) logistic regression of cannabis development from pre- to post-legalization (2013/2014 to 2016); and 3) linear regression of existing farm plant count change from pre- to post-legalization. We assessed the relationship of covariates with the model output and contextualized their patterns using the interview data. We found that most of the interview-derived covariates were significantly associated with cannabis distribution and development, including parcel size, human footprint, distance to nearest cannabis farm, density of local cannabis production, clearable land cover, farm zoning, elevation, roughness, and distance to rivers. These results provide useful insights into the dynamics of a rapid land use change frontier in a formalizing sector, as well as its potential environmental repercussions. The contextualized understanding of cannabis land use drivers may serve to mitigate environmental harm or predict changes occurring in other rural cannabis systems.