Swidden-fallow agroforestry practices in inhabited humid tropical forests create a mosaic of fields and secondary forest patches across the landscape. Previous research in riverine peasant communities in the Peruvian Amazon suggests that there is considerable variability in agroforestry practices at the household level, whereby demographics and total land holdings (a measure of income) affect crop choice and the number, size, location, and ages of secondary forest fallows. In particular, land-rich households tend to own more and older forest fallows. Changes in the distribution of land holdings through time, therefore, may drive changes in deforestation, fragmentation, and forest recovery. To analyze the dynamic effects of inequality on landscape composition and configuration, we reconstructed and mapped individual household land holdings and field histories in a traditional peasant community near Iquitos, Peru, from the mid1960s to 2007. Data were gathered through detailed household interviews (n=50), visits to all fields and fallows, and combined with data collected in 1994-5 to create a long-term dataset of land holdings. Income inequality was measured using the Gini ratio. Changes in land cover mapped through field histories were compared to independent land cover maps derived from historical airphotos and satellite imagery.
Results/Conclusions
Results suggest that income strongly affects the size, location, contiguity, and land cover of fields and fallows at the household level. Income inequality within the village has evolved through time, declining during the agrarian reforms of the 1970s but increasing thereafter. A minority of households currently hold the majority of land, thus controlling overall landscape patterns. As these households age, however, intergenerational land transfers may lead to greater equality in land holdings, while increasing fragmentation and land-use intensity. We discuss the implications of these changes in inequality for conservation and the future ecological and economic sustainability of the community.
