Population and Land Use in Developing Countries Report of a Workshop (1993) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction
1 Introduction
Pages 1-14
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Despite the interest in and importance of this question, there is a relatively small body of carefully designed research that begins to provide answers to it. In order to make progress in this field we need to understand why careful research on this topic is so scarce, examine the work that has been done, and propose ways to encourage research in an area that may be critical to the future of many countries.
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Classical economists, beginning with Malthus, stressed the difficulty of maintaining a steady or increasing standard of living given a finite resource base and a growing population. Malthus argued that food production could only grow at a linear rate while populations grew geometrically; thus population growth would ultimately outstrip the ability of the economy to meet the demand for food (Malthus, 1798~.
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For example, government subsidies have made it economically viable for people to settle the Amazon rain forest, where soil quality is poor and sustained agricultural production difficult (Schmink and Wood, 1987~. Artificially low producer prices for agricultural products and lack of property rights in many countries in Africa have given farmers few incentives to conserve their land for future use (Lele and Stone, l 9891.
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The world's population is likely to double in the next 60 years, even if fertility rates fall in virtually every developing country (United Nations, 1991; World Bank, 1992; Bureau of the Census, 1991~. This is because, regardless of how effective family planning programs may be in reducing fertility, the adult population of the next 20 years has already been born and its increased demand for food is inevitable.
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In studying the population and land use relationship, it is essential to consider both numbers of people and their behavior. Population growth influences land use patterns in combination with consumption behaviors and productive activities of the world's peoples.
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It is difficult to evaluate these changes, partly due to the poor quality of available land use data and the difficulty of determining whether climate change or human activity has had the greatest effect on land use. Wolman questions whether the absolute size of the population or the rate of population increase has been more important in affecting land use change.
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Binswanger reviewed many of the innovations that farmers in developing countries make in the face of population pressures, such as irrigation, use of fertilizers, and multiple cropping. He also discussed the differences between the development of agriculture in the United States, which had relatively low population density, and in Japan, with high population density, to illustrate the different innovations farmers may make when faced with very different resource constraints.
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He estimates the effects of population change on several agricultural investments during 1955-1987. The first stage of analysis shows that some of the investment in agricultural research, agricultural extension services, and rural infrastructure and net cropped area were induced by either population growth or increases in population density.
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He then goes on to discuss institutional change and the problems of the differences in costs between private and social environmental services. He argues that scientific and technical constraints to increased agricultural production mean that agricultural research needs to be reorganized.
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Finally, evidence based on Ester Boserup's model and research shows how population increases induce people to cultivate additional land or to farm their present land more productively, as demonstrated in Robert Evenson's paper. Most of the changes in land use associated with very rapid population growth are likely to be disadvantageous for human beings.
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With clear property rights, robust soils, and efficient markets, population growth is less likely to result in land degradation. Under these conditions, rapid population growth, which results in larger markets for agricultural products, gives land owners incentives to protect soil quality, which they are able to do by borrowing in relatively efficient capital markets.
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Only carefully designed research to elucidate causality between population growth and land use change will help researchers address the fundamental differences in their paradigms.
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Mortimore's case study of northern Nigeria suggests what some of the physical indicators might be; DeWalt's case study utilizes some of the social indicators. Only when there is a much larger number of sophisticated case studies will we be able to generalize about how current and future population growth rates in the world are likely to change land use.
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From page 14... ...
Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins University Press. United Nations, Department of International Economic and Social Affairs 1991 World Population Prospects 1990.
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