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Agricultural Frontier (agricultural + frontier)

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Life Sciences66%

Selected Abstracts

Producing a Modern Agricultural Frontier: Firms and Cooperatives in Eastern Mato Grosso, Brazil

ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 3 2006
Wendy Jepson
Abstract: In economic geography, explanations of emerging agricultural frontier regions are dominated by two theoretical perspectives: land-rent theory and political economy. This article advances current research by applying concepts from new institutional economics to reconcile these models. Drawing from a case of frontier expansion in eastern Mato Grosso state, I focus the debate on an institutional perspective. Two organizations, a colonization firm and an agricultural cooperative, are examined. The combined activities of cooperatives and firms reduced the overall costs of production in regions that are defined by high transactions costs (for example, land-tenure insecurity, poor links to the market, and imperfect information) and risk. Each organization linked individual farmers to necessary resources for commercial farming (for instance, land, capital, technology, and markets) and provided an organizational context for farmers to respond to land-tenure conflict and land degradation. The consequence was an increase in the marginal productivity of land, which translated into an expanded commercial agricultural frontier. [source]

Soil organic carbon stock change due to land use activity along the agricultural frontier of the southwestern Amazon, Brazil, between 1970 and 2002

GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY, Issue 10 2010
STOÉCIO M. F. MAIA
Abstract The southwestern portion of the Brazilian Amazon arguably represents the largest agricultural frontier in the world, and within this region the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso have about 24% and 32% of their respective areas under agricultural management, which is almost half of the total area deforested in the Brazilian Amazon biome. Consequently, it is assumed that deforestation in this region has caused substantial loss of soil organic carbon (SOC). In this study, the changes in SOC stocks due to the land use change and management in the southwestern Amazon were estimated for two time periods from 1970,1985 and 1985,2002. An uncertainty analysis was also conducted using a Monte Carlo approach. The results showed that mineral soils converted to agricultural management lost a total of 5.37 and 3.74 Tg C yr,1 between 1970,1985 and 1985,2002, respectively, along the Brazilian Agricultural Frontier in the states of Mato Grosso and Rondônia. Uncertainties in these estimates were ±37.3% and ±38.6% during the first and second time periods, respectively. The largest sources of uncertainty were associated with reference carbon (C) stocks, expert knowledge surveys about grassland condition, and the management factors for nominal and degraded grasslands. These results showed that land use change and management created a net loss of C from soils, however, the change in SOC stocks decreased substantially from the first to the second time period due to the increase in land under no-tillage. [source]

Conservation Alliances with Indigenous Peoples of the Amazon

CONSERVATION BIOLOGY, Issue 3 2005
STEPHAN SCHWARTZMAN
The future of Amazonian indigenous reserves is of strategic importance for the fate of biodiversity in the region. We examined the legislation governing resource use on indigenous lands and summarize the history of the Kayapo people's consolidation of their >100,000 km2 territory. Like many Amazonian indigenous peoples, the Kayapo have halted the expansion of the agricultural frontier on their lands but allow selective logging and gold mining. Prospects for long-term conservation and sustainability in these lands depend on indigenous peoples' understandings of their resource base and on available economic alternatives. Although forest conservation is not guaranteed by either tenure security or indigenous knowledge, indigenous societies' relatively egalitarian common-property resource management regimes,along with adequate incentives and long-term partnerships with conservation organizations,can achieve this result. Successful initiatives include Conservation International's long-term project with the A'ukre Kayapo village and incipient large-scale territorial monitoring and control in the Kayapo territory, and the Instituto SocioAmbiental (ISA) 15-year partnership with the peoples of the Xingu Indigenous Park, with projects centered on territorial monitoring and control, education, community organization, and economic alternatives. The recent agreement on ecological restoration of the Xingu River headwaters between ranchers and private companies, indigenous peoples, and environmentalists, brokered by ISA, marks the emergence of an indigenous and conservation alliance of sufficient cohesiveness and legitimacy to negotiate effectively at a regional scale. Resumen:,Las alianzas actuales entre indígenas y organizaciones de conservación en el Amazonas Brasileño han ayudado a obtener el reconocimiento oficial de ,1 millón de km2 en áreas indígenas. El futuro del as reservas indígenas amazónicas es de importancia estratégica para el futuro de la biodiversidad en la región. Examinamos la legislación que rige a la utilización de recursos en zonas indígenas y sintetizamos la historia de la consolidación del territorio > 100,000 km2 de la etnia Kayapo. Como muchos grupos Amazónicos, los Kayapo han detenido la expansión de la frontera agrícola en sus tierras pero permiten actividades madereras y mineras selectivas. Las perspectivas de conservación y sustentabilidad a largo plazo en estas tierras dependen del entendimiento de su base de recursos y de las alternativas económicas disponibles por parte de los grupos indígenas. A pesar de que ni la seguridad en la posesión ni el conocimiento indígena garantizan la conservación de los bosques, los regímenes indígenas de gestión de recursos de propiedad común relativamente igualitarios en conjunto con incentivos adecuados y asociaciones con organizaciones de conservación pueden obtener este resultado. Iniciativas exitosas incluyen el proyecto a largo plazo de Conservation International con el pueblo A'ukre Kayapo y el incipiente monitoreo y control territorial a gran escala en el territorio Kayapo y la asociación durante 15 años del Instituto Socioambiental (ISA) con habitantes del Parque Indígena Xingu, con proyectos enfocados al monitoreo y control territorial, a la educación, a la organización comunitaria y a alternativas económicas. El reciente acuerdo, negociado por ISA, entre rancheros y compañías privadas, grupos indígenas y ambientalistas para la restauración ecológica del Río Xingu marca el surgimiento de una alianza indígena y de conservación con la cohesión y legitimidad suficientes para negociar efectivamente a escala regional. [source]

Producing a Modern Agricultural Frontier: Firms and Cooperatives in Eastern Mato Grosso, Brazil

ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 3 2006
Wendy Jepson
Abstract: In economic geography, explanations of emerging agricultural frontier regions are dominated by two theoretical perspectives: land-rent theory and political economy. This article advances current research by applying concepts from new institutional economics to reconcile these models. Drawing from a case of frontier expansion in eastern Mato Grosso state, I focus the debate on an institutional perspective. Two organizations, a colonization firm and an agricultural cooperative, are examined. The combined activities of cooperatives and firms reduced the overall costs of production in regions that are defined by high transactions costs (for example, land-tenure insecurity, poor links to the market, and imperfect information) and risk. Each organization linked individual farmers to necessary resources for commercial farming (for instance, land, capital, technology, and markets) and provided an organizational context for farmers to respond to land-tenure conflict and land degradation. The consequence was an increase in the marginal productivity of land, which translated into an expanded commercial agricultural frontier. [source]

Soil organic carbon stock change due to land use activity along the agricultural frontier of the southwestern Amazon, Brazil, between 1970 and 2002

GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY, Issue 10 2010
STOÉCIO M. F. MAIA
Abstract The southwestern portion of the Brazilian Amazon arguably represents the largest agricultural frontier in the world, and within this region the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso have about 24% and 32% of their respective areas under agricultural management, which is almost half of the total area deforested in the Brazilian Amazon biome. Consequently, it is assumed that deforestation in this region has caused substantial loss of soil organic carbon (SOC). In this study, the changes in SOC stocks due to the land use change and management in the southwestern Amazon were estimated for two time periods from 1970,1985 and 1985,2002. An uncertainty analysis was also conducted using a Monte Carlo approach. The results showed that mineral soils converted to agricultural management lost a total of 5.37 and 3.74 Tg C yr,1 between 1970,1985 and 1985,2002, respectively, along the Brazilian Agricultural Frontier in the states of Mato Grosso and Rondônia. Uncertainties in these estimates were ±37.3% and ±38.6% during the first and second time periods, respectively. The largest sources of uncertainty were associated with reference carbon (C) stocks, expert knowledge surveys about grassland condition, and the management factors for nominal and degraded grasslands. These results showed that land use change and management created a net loss of C from soils, however, the change in SOC stocks decreased substantially from the first to the second time period due to the increase in land under no-tillage. [source]