Deforestation In Colombia Research Articles

The impact of agricultural credit on the cattle inventory and deforestation in Colombia: a spatial analysis

The relationship between agricultural credit and agricultural production as well as the impacts on sustainable development (i.e., poverty alleviation, reduction of inequalities, food and nutrition security, and stimulation of economic growth) have been widely documented. The objective of this study is to analyze the impact of credit on cattle production and deforestation in Colombia through spatial panel data models. For this purpose, a departmental data panel for the period 2011–2020 was built, based on available information from public entities. The results suggest that in Colombia, the relationship between access to credit and cattle production is significant and can be either negative or positive. In addition, there is evidence of spatial dependence, meaning that cattle production in one department is being affected by cattle production in a neighboring department or by all the departments that make up the national territory. Regarding deforestation, results show that, although the number of cattle present in a department does affect its annual deforestation rate due to a poor coverage of sustainably intensified cattle ranching systems, there is no relationship between deforestation and the access to credit nor any spatial correlations.

An approach to the analysis of deforestation in Colombia, applications of physical tools

Deforestation, a global challenge with significant environmental and social impacts, raises pressing concerns for the sustainability of the planet, especially in Colombia. This phenomenon, particularly relevant in the Colombian context where biodiversity and national identity are intrinsically linked, has undergone a dramatic transformation in recent decades due to the expansion of anthropogenic activities. This article clarifies the current state of the problem, discusses the efforts undertaken by the Office of the Procuraduria General de la Nación colombiana, and proposes an innovative approach by integrating statistical tools, formalism inherent to statistical mechanics, and geographical features. Leveraging quarterly data issued by the Instituto de Hidrología, Meteorología y Estudios Ambientales, such as early deforestation alerts, the study will outline a methodology to discern patterns and behaviors.

A spatial regression analysis of Colombia’s narcodeforestation with factor decomposition of multiple predictors

In the current accelerated process of global warming, forest conservation is becoming more difficult to address in developing countries, where woodlands are often fueling the illegal economy. In Colombia, the issue of narcodeforestation is of great concern, because of the ramification of narcoactivities that are affecting forests, such as agribusinesses and cattle ranching for money laundering. In this study, we use spatially explicit regressions incorporating a factor decomposition of predictors through principal component analysis to understand the impact of coca plantations on global and local-scale deforestation in Colombia. At national level we find a positive and statistically significant relationship between coca crops and deforestation. At the regional level, in two out of four regions, it appears that coca is causing deforestation, especially in the Department of Northern Santander and on the Pacific coast. The spatial models used reveal not only a direct effect but also positive and significant spillover effects, in line with the conjecture that narcodeforestation is not only due to the quest for new areas to expand coca-cultivation, which would determine a loss of forest only in the municipality where coca cultivation increases, but also to the need to launder illegal profits, or create clandestine routes and airplane strips, which can affect forests also in nearby municipalities.

The political rationalities of governing deforestation in Colombia

Reducing emissions by deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) is a mechanism that aims to reduce global carbon emissions by protecting tropical forests. The practice of REDD+ implementation varies considerably in different contexts and studies have pointed its persistence despite concrete results. In this article, we focus on how rationalities of government intervene in the translation of REDD+ from the global level to national policy practice in Colombia. From our empirical analysis, we identify four distinct rationalities that intervene in the translation of REDD+: 1) a legal rationality that is derived from the securitization of nature and that aims to implement command-and-control measures in forest margins; 2) a spatial rationality that is rooted in the techno managerial aspects of the international negotiations and that has the ambition to order the forest and make it productive; 3) a market rationality that sees organized enterprises as a promising tool to control deforestation; and 4) an ethnic rationality that pushes to recognize rights and knowledge of ethnic minorities and emphasizes their role in stopping deforestation. The article concludes with discussing the intersection of these different rationalities and the overlapping visions of government that these embody to explain why REDD+ persists as a policy solution. Specifically, while some of these rationalities disenfranchise local actors, the engagement of Indigenous groups with the political rationalities provides an opportunity to leverage local power and authority.

Impacts of land cover changes and global warming on climate in Colombia during ENSO events

Colombia is highly vulnerable to climate change which may be intensified due to the climatic effects of regional deforestation. Here, we quantify the impact of historical (1900–2011) land cover changes (LCC) and of global warming during ENSO events (CC) on precipitation, temperature and surface energy balance components by running the Weather Research and Forecasting model WRF v3.9 at 10 km resolution. We find that historical anthropogenic CC causes a mean temperature increase of 0.77 ± 0.02 °C in Colombia, which is more pronounced in high altitudes. Precipitation is enhanced by 0.98 ± 0.30 mm/day (+ 9%), particularly over forested areas and reduced at the Pacific coast. LCC imply a reduction of precipitation particularly above the Andes (− 0.48 ± 0.10 mm/day) and Caribbean Coast (− 0.67 ± 0.12 mm/day), where LCC effects dampen CC effects by 24% and 72%, respectively. La Niña tends to intensify LCC and CC effects in the Andes but dampens them at the Coast, roughly by a factor of two compared to El Niño impacts in both regions. At the subregional level, LCC and CC can have impacts of similar magnitude on precipitation highlighting the need to precisely account for both drivers in hydroclimatic assessments. Contrary to almost all observations and similar simulations with climate models, WRF simulates a cooling bias after historical deforestation in Colombia, even with alternative WRF land surface models. We identify two main sources of biases in the default WRF parametrization to explain this inaccuracy: (1) surface shortwave radiation reflected after deforestation is overestimated; (2) associated evapotranspiration loss is underestimated. Improved model representation and validation of tropical vegetation properties are necessary to provide more robust and confident projections.

The effect of illicit crops on forest cover in Colombia

ABSTRACT Many armed conflicts worldwide occur in biodiversity hotspots and nearly 50% of those conflicts occur in forested regions. In Colombia, the armed conflict has implied the clearing of large forest tracts for the establishment of illicit crops. The aim of this study was to assess the role that illicit crops played in the deforestation dynamics in Colombia between 2001 and 2014. We established a database with the annual deforestation rates and nine predictors for 1120 municipalities and built fixed effects models that take spatial autocorrelation into account. Model selection with AIC suggested that the area cultivated with coca crops was the best predictor of annual rates of deforestation, whereas coca crop removal was associated with increasing forest cover. According to our results, coca crops promoted deforestation in Colombia between 2001 and 2014 through indirect (spilling-over to nearby areas), immediate and temporally-lagged mechanisms.

The Political Rationalities of Governing Deforestation in Colombia

The Political Rationalities of Governing Deforestation in Colombia

Militarisation Under COVID-19: Understanding the Differential Impact of Lockdown on the Forests of Colombia

Drawing on qualitative analysis and anthropological histories, we argue that deforestation rates in the Inter-Andean Valleys and in the Amazon Belt of Colombia reflect the specific role of the military in different articulations of the political forest along with new connections between conservation and the war on drugs. This paper examines the increase in deforestation in Colombia in 2020 that partially coincided with the “lockdown” imposed to curb the spread of COVID-19. Early media analysis linked this with the redeployment of military forces away from forest protection to impose lockdown restrictions. However, closer investigation reveals significant regional variation in both the reorganisation of military groups, and in the rate at which deforestation has materialised; military presence has increased in some regions, while in others deforestation has increased. To explain this, we unpack the “biopolitical” dimensions of international conservation to show how the specific deployment of military groups in Colombia reflects an interplay between notions of the protection of (species) life, longer colonial histories, and more recent classification of geographies in terms of riskiness and value.

Addressing Coca-Related Deforestation in Colombia: A Call for Aligning Drug and Environmental Policies for Sustainable Development

In Colombia, deforestation is one of the most relevant environmental problems, and the cultivation of illicit coca crops is often mentioned as one of its direct and indirect drivers. Over the past two decades, both dynamics have been converging, and are now found in largely the same areas. These tend to be characterized by weak governmental control, the presence of illegal armed groups, and adverse socioeconomic conditions. Alarmingly, almost half of the illicit coca cultivation has recently been found in the environmentally sensitive Special Management Zones of Colombia (such as protected areas and forest reservation zones or ethnic territories). This policy commentary highlights potential sustainable development approaches to address coca-related deforestation in Colombia. It takes into account the country’s current public policy framework and practical experiences of the Colombian Government as well as the Global Partnership on Drug Policies and Development (GPDPD), a programme at Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, and its partners. These interventions are based on the Alternative Development (AD) concept that introduces viable and legal livelihood alternatives in coca-growing areas to promote rural development and discourage illicit cultivation. The article suggests aligning drug and environmental policies to implement integrated AD programmes with an environmental dimension through elements such as agroforestry, forest governance strategies or Payments for Ecosystem Services. It further calls for improved framework conditions through an updated cadastral and land titling system. In Special Management Zones, differentiated approaches are necessary to tailor interventions to the specific environmental and cultural conditions of these territories.

Drivers and effects of deforestation in Colombia: a systems thinking approach

Drivers and effects of deforestation in Colombia: a systems thinking approach

Spatial-temporal dynamics of deforestation and its drivers indicate need for locally-adapted environmental governance in Colombia

Characterizing and managing deforestation are some of the most urgent environmental challenges in the tropics. Forest loss depends on multiple drivers that relate to ecological and socio-economic conditions, and varies significantly in time and space. Understanding the causes and potential consequences of forest loss in a region, requires detailed knowledge of the spatial and temporal behavior of deforestation drivers. This is especially important in Colombia, a country with an immense geographical, ecological and cultural diversity. In this work we use a spatially-explicit modeling platform to identify the influence of multiple deforestation drivers in different biogeographical and planning regions of Colombia. Models were used to produce different deforestation scenarios, resulting in contrasting trends. Results suggest that agricultural activities have a significant role in deforestation in Colombia, although its influence largely varies among regions. Notably, the long-lasting internal conflict in the country, indicated here by a proxy variable, produced contrasting effects on historical deforestation, such that in some areas it acted as an attractor and in some others as a deterrent of deforestation. Our scenarios for the mid-21st century indicate that current trends in deforestation and its drivers (except the internal conflict due to a recent peace agreement) can potentially lead to major ecological impacts, such as fragmentation and loss of connectivity among ecosystems. In the Governance scenario, however, enforcement of conservation in protected areas ensures partial forest conservation, highlighting the key relevance of these areas for biodiversity conservation in the country and for controlling the expansion of deforestation. Given the high spatial and temporal variability of deforestation, and that the same drivers can lead to different responses in different geographic areas, decision-making needs a more efficient approach for designing locally-adapted measurements to face current challenges of conservation and management of forests and their services.

Buying a Blind Eye: Campaign Donations, Forbearance, and Deforestation in Colombia

While existing work has demonstrated that campaign donations can buy access to benefits such as favorable legislation and preferential contracting, we highlight another use of campaign contributions: buying forbearance. Specifically, we argue that in return for campaign contributions, Colombian mayors who rely on donor-funding (compared to those who do not) choose not to enforce sanctions against illegal deforestation activities. Using a regression discontinuity design we show that deforestation is significantly higher in municipalities that elect donor-funded as opposed to self-funded politicians. Further analysis shows that only part of this effect can be explained by differences is contracting practices by donor-funded mayors. Instead, evidence from analysis of fire clearance, and of heterogeneity in the effects according to the presence of alternative formal and informal enforcement institutions, supports the interpretation that campaign contributions buy forbearance from enforcement of environmental regulations.

How effective have been guerrilla occupation and protected areas in avoiding deforestation in Colombia?

Impact assessment and monitoring of conservation strategies are required to guarantee successful conservation outcomes. The establishment of protected areas (PAs) is a worldwide conservation strategies, but some PAs are not effective in avoiding deforestation. On the other hand, armed conflicts have ambiguous effects on wildlife. Colombia is a megadiverse country that not only has a huge network of PAs but also shows a high deforestation rate and a 50-years-old armed conflict. Here, we assessed the impact of the Colombian PAs and the FARC-EP guerrilla (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) occupation areas in avoiding deforestation in the country. For that, we compared the forest cover of PAs and FARC areas with environmentally similar control areas to assess forest loss from 2000 to 2017. We found that only large Colombian PAs were effective in avoiding deforestation over the last 17 years and that FARC presence increased deforestation in the country. Our results showed that the establishment of PA alone is not enough to ensure a positive conservation outcome. Our study offered a broad-scale analysis of Colombian PA impacts in avoiding deforestation as well as FARC's role in forest loss. Colombia has several challenges to reduce its deforestation rate and to enhance the impact of PA in avoiding deforestation. Those challenges include the solution of the land tenure conflict, improvement of current legislation, strengthening governance, and conflict resolution. Further, Colombia needs to deal with obstacles derived from armed conflict itself, particularly in the historic FARC areas, where fundamental conservation efforts are mostly needed.

Communal Property Rights and Deforestation

Almost a third of the world’s forest area is communally managed. In principle, this arrangement could lead to a ‘tragedy of the commons’ and therefore more deforestation. But it may be easier to monitor outsiders’ deforestation of land owned by a community rather than an individual. We present a theoretical framework to examine these trade-offs and empirically study the effect of communal titling on deforestation in Colombia. Our empirical approach uses a differences-in-discontinuities strategy that compares areas just outside and inside a title, before and after titling. We find that deforestation decreased in communal areas after titling, especially in small communities, which is consistent with the model’s predictions. We also find evidence of positive spillovers: titling reduced deforestation in nearby areas outside the title (and thus our estimates are a lower bound of the total effects of communal titling on deforestation).

Reducing deforestation in Colombia while building peace and pursuing business as usual extractivism?

In this article, I examine the contradictions and tensions in Colombia's simultaneous embrace of REDD+ and a peace-building process premised on continued extractivism. Colombia is emerging from an internal conflict that lasted more than 50 years. In this process rural land-use is being transformed, generating new conflicts over land use and control with detrimental effects on Colombia's forests. Based on official documents, reports, existing scholarly work, interviews and observations collected during fieldwork in the Colombian Amazon, I analyze the ways in which peace-building and post-conflict transition have precipitated factors which have aggravated land conflicts and led to the escalation of deforestation in Colombia. I argue that Colombia's current REDD+ efforts mainly serve to attract international funding and legitimize the status quo since they remain disconnected from the structural processes that directly and indirectly drive deforestation. As such, REDD+ in Colombia contributes to a contradictory neoliberal approach to development, which promises to safeguard the environment, while supporting large-scale extractive industries, mining, cattle ranching and intensive agriculture, resulting in the increase in deforestation and forest degradation.Key Words: Colombia, post-conflict, peace-building, extractivism, deforestation, REDD+

Conflict, Environment and Transition: Colombia, Ecology and Tourism after Demobilisation

In 2016, Colombia’s left-wing guerrilla FARC-EP (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia—Ejército del Pueblo) began demobilisation. While demobilisation and the ensuing peace accords brought renewed hope that the country could imagine different political and social relations—and new ecological and economic conditions—multinational corporations filled the ‘void’ left by FARC-EP forces. Corporate interests in Colombia’s natural resources predated the demobilisation. However, extractive processes were restricted by the dynamics of the armed conflict. In 2016, immediately following the demobilisation, deforestation in Colombia jumped 44 per cent. In the transitional demobilisation period, huge swaths of the country were opened for economic development. Thus, while the environment is often a victim in armed conflict, in Colombia, conflict contributed to the preservation of some areas. Among the forms of development that have emerged in Colombia, ‘ecotourism’ has risen quickly to the fore. While ecotourism may offer some promise, it should be viewed with caution.

Communal Property Rights and Deforestation: Evidence From Colombia

Deforestation is a large contributor to climate change. Controlling deforestation is difficult, especially because there are 484 million of hectares of forest that are community owned. In principle this arrangement could lead to a tragedy of the commons, however there could be economies of scale on monitoring outsiders' deforestation. We study the effect of communal titling on deforestation in Colombia, using a difference-in-differences strategy at the border. We find that deforestation decreased only in small communal titles, even when the control area are national parks. This suggests that communal titling can be effective on reducing deforestation if inhabitants can monitor the area titled.

Sediment load trends in the Magdalena River basin (1980–2010): Anthropogenic and climate-induced causes

The Colombian Andes and its main river basin, the Magdalena, have witnessed dramatic changes in land cover and further forest loss during the last three decades. For the Magdalena River, human activities appear to have played a more prominent role compared to rainfall (climate change) to mobilize sediment. However, environmental authorities in Colombia argue that climate change is the main trigger of erosion and floods experienced during the last decade. Here we present the first regional exercise addressing the following: (1) what are the observed trends of sediment load in the northern Andes during the last three decades? and (2) are sediment load trends in agreement with tendencies in land use change and climate (e.g., precipitation)? We perform Mann-Kendall tests on sediment load series for 21 main tributary systems during the 1980–2010 period. These gauging stations represent 77% of the whole Magdalena basin area. The last decade has been a period of increased pulses in sediment transport as seen by the statistical significant trends in load. Overall, six subcatchments, representing 55% of the analyzed Magdalena basin area, have witnessed increasing trends in sediment load. Also, some major tributaries have experienced changes in their interannual mean sediment flux during the mid- 1990s and 2005. Further analysis of land cover change (e.g., deforestation) indicates that the basin has undergone considerable change. Forest cover decreased by 40% over the period of study, while the area under agriculture and pasture cover (agricultural lands 1 and 2) increased by 65%. The highest peak of forest loss on record in the Magdalena basin, 5106km2 or 24% of the combined deforestation in Colombia, occurred during the 2005-2010 period. In contrast, Mann-Kendall tests on rainfall series for 61 stations reveal that precipitation shows no regional signs of increasing trends. Also, increasing trends in sediment load match quite well with the marked increase in forest clearance during the 1990–2000 and 2005–2010 periods. Such signs of increasing sediment fluxes should not be attributed to climate change and rainfall variability alone. As a whole, the Magdalena, one of the top 10 rivers in terms of sediment delivery to the ocean (184Mty−1), and its tributaries have experienced increasing trends in sediment load during the 1980–2010 period; increases in close agreement with trends in land use change and deforestation. During the last decade, the Magdalena River drainage basin has witnessed an increase in erosion rates of 34%, from 550tkm−2y−1 before 2000 to 710tkm−2y−1 for the 2000–2010 period, and the average sediment load for the whole basin increased to 44Mty−1 for the same period. Similar to the global picture of human contribution to sediment generation, the rate of anthropogenic soil erosion in the Magdalena basin probably exceeds the rate of climate-driven erosion by several orders of magnitude.

The Unintended Consequences of Anti-Drug Programs in Producing Countries

This paper investigates the possible negative local economic effects and crime spillovers of the biggest anti-drug program ever applied within a producing country: aerial spraying with herbicides. It also investigates the correlation between local economic development and illegal drug production in drug-producing-areas, which was previously restricted by the unavailability of good quality micro data. To do this, I put together unique and rich georeferenced panel data from satellite images with information at the 1-square-kilometer cell level on coca cultivation, night light density, and deforestation in Colombia. By employing state-of-the-art spatial econometrics, I find no evidence of negative effects of aerial spraying on deforestation nor spillover effects on crime. However, I find sizable negative effects of aerial spraying on local economic activity (measured through night light density). I also find no evidence of a significant correlation between night light density and coca cultivation. However, there are strong negative effects of coca cultivation on deforestation. JEL Classification: K42, O12, O54.

Identifying hotspots of deforestation and reforestation in Colombia (2001–2010): implications for protected areas

The conversion of natural areas to human‐dominated land uses has been the major cause of global biodiversity decline and ecosystem degradation. Protected areas have been the most common strategy for reducing habitat and species loss. Effective conservation planning requires current information on land change dynamics, and the factors driving these changes. Therefore, our main goal was to assess the implications of land change on present and future protected areas. Specifically, we identified hotspots of reforestation and deforestation in Colombia between 2001 and 2010, and we determined the factors that explained land change within these hotspots. We identified four reforestation hotpots located mainly in the highlands of the Andes, and four deforestation hotpots that were located in the lowlands. Environmental and armed conflict variables explained most of the variation in the woody vegetation and agriculture/pasture classes, respectively. Although protected areas cover 12% of the country, only 4% of the reforestation and deforestation hotspots included protected areas. In Colombia, as well as the rest of the world, the majority of protected lands occur in remote regions where there are little to no economic activities and threats. Although we recognize the importance of this conservation approach, particularly for long‐term conservation of large areas, we believe that complementary approaches that incorporate current land change dynamics are essential for future protected area planning. These approaches would place higher value on establishing new protected areas in regions that are undergoing rapid land change or regions where agricultural activities have been abandoned and ecosystems are beginning to recovery. The first approach would have immediate conservation benefits, while the second approach could bring ecosystem benefits in the short to intermediate‐term and biodiversity benefits in the medium to long‐term. These complementary approaches can provide helpful information for protected area conservation planning in a world with rapid land change.