The role of soybean production as an underlying driver of deforestation in the South American Chaco |
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| Institution: | 1. Geography Department, Humboldt-University Berlin, Unter den Linden 6, 10099 Berlin, Germany;2. CONICET, Instituto de Ecología Regional, Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, 4107 Yerba Buena, Tucumán, Argentina;3. Integrative Research Institute on Transformations of Human-Environment Systems (IRI THESys), Humboldt-University Berlin, Unter den Linden 6, 10099 Berlin, Germany;4. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA), Instituto de Recursos Biológicos, Centro de Investigación en Recursos Naturales (CIRN-IRB), De los Reseros y Las Cabañas S/N HB1712WAA Hurlingham, Buenos Aires, Argentina;1. Department of International Environment and Development Studies (Noragric), Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU), PO. Box 5003, NO 1432 Ås, Norway;2. Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM), University of Oslo (UiO), PO. Box 1116, Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway;1. Grupo de Estudios Ambientales – IMASL, Universidad Nacional de San Luis, CONICET, Ejército de los Andes 950, D5700HHW San Luis, Argentina;2. INTA, EEA Valle Inferior, Ruta Nacional N° 3 km 971, camino 4, 8500 Viedma, Argentina;3. Universidad de La Punta, Av. Universitaria s/n, D5710 La Punta, Argentina;4. Instituto de Silvicultura y Manejo de Bosques, Universidad Nacional de Santiago del Estero, Av. Belgrano 1912, G4200ABT Santiago del Estero, Argentina;1. CONICET Instituto de Ecología Regional, Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, Casilla de Correo 34, 4107 Yerba Buena, Tucumán, Argentina;2. CONICET-UNT, Intituos Superior de Estudios Sociales (ISES), Argentina;1. Grupo de Ecología del Paisaje y Modelación de Ecosistemas ECOLMOD, Departamento de Biología, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Sede Bogotá, Colombia;2. CREAF-Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications, 08193 Cerdanyola del Valles, Barcelona,Spain;3. Unitat d''Ecología, Universitat Autonòma de Barcelona, 08193 Cerdanyola del Valles, Barcelona, Spain;1. Geography Department, Humboldt-University Berlin, Unter den Linden 6, 10099 Berlin, Germany;2. Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, University of California Berkeley, 130 Mulford Hall #3114, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA;3. Instituto de Ecología Regional, Universidad Nacional de Tucumán and CONICET, CC 34, 4107 Yerba Buena, Argentina;4. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA), Instituto de Recursos Biológicos, Centro de Investigación en Recursos Naturales (CIRN-IRB), De los Reseros y Las Cabañas S/N HB1712WAA Hurlingham, Buenos Aires, Argentina;5. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA) Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Salta, Ruta Nac. 68 km 172, Cerrillos, Salta, Argentina;6. Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Theodor-Lieser-Straße 2, 06120 Halle, Saale, Germany;7. Integrative Research Institute for Transformations in Human Environment Systems (IRI THESys), Humboldt-University Berlin, Unter den Linden 6, 10099 Berlin, Germany |
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| Abstract: | South America’s tropical dry forests and savannas are under increasing pressure from agricultural expansion. Cattle ranching and soybean production both drive these forest losses, but their relative importance remains unclear. Also unclear is how soybean expansion elsewhere affects deforestation via pushing cattle ranching to deforestation frontiers. To assess these questions, we focused on the Chaco, a 110 million ha ecoregion extending into Argentina, Bolivia, and Paraguay, with about 8 million ha of deforestation in 2000–2012. We used panel regressions at the district level to quantify the role of soybean expansion in driving these forest losses using a wide range of environmental and socio-economic control variables. Our models suggest that soybean production was a direct driver of deforestation in the Argentine Chaco only (0.08 ha new soybean area per ha forest lost), whereas cattle ranching was significantly associated with deforestation in all three countries (0.02 additional cattle per hectare forest loss). However, our models also suggested Argentine soybean cultivation may indirectly be linked to deforestation in the Bolivian and Paraguayan Chaco. We furthermore found substantial time-delayed effects in the relationship of soybean expansion in Argentina and Paraguay (i.e., soybean expansion in one year resulted in deforestation several years later) and deforestation in the Chaco, further suggesting that possible displacement effects within and between Chaco countries may at least partly drive forest loss. Altogether, our study showed that deforestation in the Chaco appears to be mainly driven by the globally surging demand for soybean, although regionally other proximate drivers are sometimes important. Steering agricultural production in the Chaco and other tropical dry forests onto sustainable pathways will thus require policies that consider these scale effects and that account for the regional variation in deforestation drivers within and across countries. |
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| Keywords: | Deforestation Dry forests Savannas Soybean Cattle ranching Drivers of land-use change Gran chaco |
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