Global deforestation patterns: comparing recent and past forest loss processes through a spatially explicit analysis

Abstract

SUMMARY This study explores how deforestation relates to biophysical and socio-economic variables in a quantitative, spatially explicit analysis. Both patterns of historical (approximately 4000 B.C. — 2000 A.D.) and recent (1990–2005) deforestation were explored and compared. The study uses location analysis, combining spatially explicit global databases of deforestation with variables hypothesized to relate to deforestation (e.g. rural livestock density, cost-distance). The results show that historical and recent deforestation show similar patterns when plotted against the selected variables suggesting the relations to be empirical. The strongest relations were between deforestation and rural population density, cost-distance and crop suitability respectively. These findings support the hypothesis that agricultural expansion was the largest direct cause of deforestation historically and it continues to be the largest direct cause today. While crop suitability showed a strong correlation with deforestatio...