Future scenarios of land use change in the Gran Chaco: how far is zero-deforestation?

Future scenarios of land use change in the Gran Chaco: how far is zero-deforestation?

The Gran Chaco (Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil) has turned into a global deforestation hotspot as a consequence of the agricultural expansion. These land use changes can lead to large socio-ecological conflicts. To reduce adverse effects, common regional planning is needed, which requires d...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Regional environmental change Vol. 22; no. 4
Main Authors: Mosciaro, María Jesús, Calamari, Noelia Cecilia, Peri, Pablo Luis, Montes, Nelson Flores, Seghezzo, Lucas, Ortiz, Edder, Rejalaga, Larissa, Barral, Paula, Villarino, Sebastián, Mastrangelo, Matías, Volante, José
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01-12-2022
Springer
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects:
Agricultural expansion
Analysis
Climate Change
Climate Change/Climate Change Impacts
Deforestation
Earth and Environmental Science
Ecological effects
Environment
Environmental conflicts
Geography
Land use
Land use management
Land use planning
Laws, regulations and rules
Nature Conservation
Oceanography
Original Article
Planning
Regional planning
Regional/Spatial Science
Spatial data
State regulations
Sustainable use
Threat evaluation
Chaco
Zero deforestation
LUCC
Gran Chaco
Land use planning
Patterns of change
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Summary:The Gran Chaco (Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil) has turned into a global deforestation hotspot as a consequence of the agricultural expansion. These land use changes can lead to large socio-ecological conflicts. To reduce adverse effects, common regional planning is needed, which requires diagnostic and prospective information on the territorial dynamics. In this context, we analyzed possible land use change threats over time according to four scenarios of agricultural expansion under different degrees of market opening and state regulation (inertial scenario, high transformation scenario, low transformation scenario, and rigorous law enforcement). Additionally, we identified areas of high susceptibility to deforestation by combining the spatial information from each scenario. We found that the magnitude of the land use changes in the Gran Chaco varies across scenarios, with common spatial patterns of change in the areas adjacent to paddocks previously deforested. This work contributed to a better understanding of the land use change patterns and to envisioning the potential consequences of alternative future land use change scenarios in the Gran Chaco. Particularly, deforestation was analyzed to measure the gap between scenarios and the internationally assumed zero-deforestation objectives. We also identified the areas of greater susceptibility to deforestation where protection efforts should be prioritized when designing future land-use policies and forest governance systems. We demonstrated how scenario generation and simulation models can provide deep insights into the spatiotemporal patterns of deforestation hotspot regions for more sustainable land use planning.
ISSN:1436-3798
1436-378X
DOI:10.1007/s10113-022-01965-5