This study uses a combination of remote sensing data, field observations and information from local people to analyze the patterns and dynamics of land-use/cover changes for 35 years from 1972 to 2007 in the arid and semi-arid Northern Afar rangelands, Ethiopia. A pixel-based supervised image classification was used to map land-use/cover classes. People's perceptions and ecological time-lines were used to explain the driving forces linked to the changes. A rapid reduction in woodland cover (97%) and grassland cover (88%) took place between 1972 and 2007.

Economic globalization manifests in landscapes through regional integration initiatives involving trans-boundary infrastructure. While the relationships of roads, accessibility and land cover are well-understood, they have rarely been considered across borders in national frontier regions. We therefore pursue an analysis of infrastructure connectivity and land cover change in the tri-national frontier of the southwestern Amazon where Bolivia, Brazil and Peru meet, and where the Inter-Oceanic Highway has recently been paved.

In the Brazilian Amazon, insecure property rights are among the main causes of land conflicts and deforestation. Through an in-depth empirical case study in Maranhao in the Eastern Amazon, this research analyzes how distorted agrarian, forest and environmental policies, laws and regulations originated insecure property rights not only over land, but also over timber, which allied to social and political factors, such as uneven distribution of land and strong organization of landless peasants, led to land conflicts and deforestation.

Many of the world's forests are being destroyed at a rapid rate. This article analyzes the decisions of landowners in Maine, where forests have been heavily harvested and much land has been converted to non-forest use. Data on these landowners and their land were obtained from primary and secondary sources, satellite change detection analysis, and structured interviews. We found that there are several different landowner groups making different harvesting decisions in response to different incentives.

Multitemporal 1 km NOAA/AVHRR Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) maximum composite imagery was utilized in combination with rainfall, soil types, and field survey data on dominant rural activities to assess the risk of land degradation in southern Mauritania. Mauritania is one of eight continental West African Sahel countries that stretch from Chad to the northwestern Atlantic coast, and from the southern fringe of the Sahara Desert to the northern limit of the Sudanian climatic zone.

BACKGROUND: Ethiopia encompasses an extraordinary number of ecological zones and plant diversity. However, the diversity of plants is highly threatened due to lack of institutional capacity, population pressure, land degradation and deforestation. An adequate documentation of these plants also has not been conducted. The farmers in Ethiopia face serious and growing food insecurity caused by drought, land degradation and climate change. Thus, rural communities are dependent on underutilized wild edible plants to meet their food and nutritional needs.

No processo de reforma agrária brasileiro é comum a redistribuição de terra ocorrer por meio de invasões das grandes proprieades pelos sem terra. Esse mecanismo introduz insegurança no direito de propriedade fundiária e, na Regîão Amazônica, tem como consequência o excesso de desflorestamento. Esse trabalho utiliza um jogo não-cooperativo para mostrar que as interações estratégicas entre proprietários e posseiros em um contexto instittucional onde as florestas naturais são consideradas como recursos de livre acesso implicam o excesso de desflorestamento.

This study looks at wood curio carving in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, Africa. Although the local people, Ndebele and Shona, have always carved, they now face a weakened economy, due in large part to land reforms in 2000. Thus, more people sculpt wood as a form of livelihood. As one man said “Starvation taught me art”. As a result, gender roles are shifting as men and women begin to enter realms previously reserved for the other. Environmentally, carvers poaching trees deforests the woodlands. As more individuals turn to making crafts sustainability deteriorates.

In rural areas, land use and cover change is often the cumulative result of individual farmer decisions. The goal was to construct a spatial typology of farming systems and assess their influence on the extent and spatial distribution of deforestation, forest re-growth, and agriculture expansion in southern Chile between 1999 and 2007. We present a farm typology and its spatial rendering through the combination of farm-cadastral information and land cover and change data. Using multivariate statistical methods, four types were identified.

AIM: To evaluate trend analysis of earth observation (EO) dense time series as a new way of describing and mapping changes in ecosystem functioning at regional to global scales. Spatio‐temporal patterns of change covering 1982–2011 are discussed in the context of changes in land use and land cover (LULCC). LOCATION: Global.

Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries (REDD+) is regarded by its proponents as one of the more efficient and cost effective ways to mitigate climate change. There was further progress toward the implementation of this mechanism at the 16th Conference of Parties (COP) in Cancun in December 2010. Many countries in southern African, including South Africa, have not been integrated (do not participate) into the UN-REDD+ programme, probably due to their low forest cover and national rates of deforestation.

The Dadia forest complex, in the Evros prefecture, in north eastern Greece was designated as a nature reserve in 1980 in order to protect the black vulture (Aegypius monachus) and other raptors. In this paper, the impacts of the protection on the forest growth were assessed using geographic information system (GIS) technologies. The major requirement for almost all research needed for sustainable forest management is extensive and intensive monitoring. GIS is a convenient tool for integrating remotely sensed data and various other kinds geo-referenced data.