Drivers and trajectories of land cover change in East Africa: Human and environmental interactions from 6000 years ago to present

Marchant, Rob; Richer, Suzi; Boles, Oliver; Capitani, Claudia; Mustaphi, Colin J. Courtney; Lane, Paul; Prendergast, Mary E.; Stump, Daryl; Cort, Gijs De; Kaplan, Jed O.; Phelps, Leanne N.; Kay, Andrea; Olago, Daniel; Petek, Nik; Platts, Philip J.; Punwong, Paramita; Widgren, Mats; Wynne‐Jones, Stephanie; Ferro-Vázquez, Cruz; Benard, Jacquiline; Boivin, Nicole; Crowther, Alison; Cuní-Sanchez, Aida; Deere, Nicolas J.; Ekblom, Anneli; Farmer, Jenny; Finch, Jemma; Fuller, Dorian Q.; Gaillard-Lemdahl, Marie-José; Gillson, Lindsey; Githumbi, Esther; Kabora, Tabitha; Kariuki, Rebecca; Kinyanjui, Rahab; Kyazike, Elizabeth; Lang, Carol; Lejju, Julius Bunny; Morrison, Kathleen D.; Muiruri, Veronica M.; Mumbi, C.T.; Muthoni, Rebecca; Muzuka, Alfred N. N.; Ndiema, Emmanuel; Nzabandora, Chantal Kabonyi; Onjala, Isaya O.; Schrijver, Annemiek Pas; Rucina, Stephen M.; Shoemaker, Anna; Thornton-Barnett, Senna; Plas, Geert van der; Watson, Elizabeth E.; Williamson, David; Wright, David K.

doi:10.1016/j.earscirev.2017.12.010

Cited by 151 publications

(111 citation statements)

References 524 publications

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“…Recent developments in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) show an increasing trend of conversion of natural land cover into arable land [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. Drivers of change are manifold and can be directly linked to human activities such as population growth, economic development, and globalization [11,12]. Natural processes like floods, landslides, droughts and climate change affect land use and land cover change (LULCC) [9], although they are induced by anthropogenic activities to a certain degree.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

et al. 2019

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Many parts of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are prone to land use and land cover change (LULCC). In many cases, natural systems are converted into agricultural land to feed the growing population. However, despite climate change being a major focus nowadays, the impacts of these conversions on water resources, which are essential for agricultural production, is still often neglected, jeopardizing the sustainability of the socio-ecological system. This study investigates historic land use/land cover (LULC) patterns as well as potential future LULCC and its effect on water quantities in a complex tropical catchment in Tanzania. It then compares the results using two climate change scenarios. The Land Change Modeler (LCM) is used to analyze and to project LULC patterns until 2030 and the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is utilized to simulate the water balance under various LULC conditions. Results show decreasing low flows by 6-8% for the LULC scenarios, whereas high flows increase by up to 84% for the combined LULC and climate change scenarios. The effect of climate change is stronger compared to the effect of LULCC, but also contains higher uncertainties. The effects of LULCC are more distinct, although crop specific effects show diverging effects on water balance components. This study develops a methodology for quantifying the impact of land use and climate change and therefore contributes to the sustainable management of the investigated catchment, as it shows the impact of environmental change on hydrological extremes (low flow and floods) and determines hot spots, which are critical for environmental development.Sustainability 2019, 11, 7083 2 of 28 increased agricultural outputs such as food and timber production [9,13]. Several water-related targets of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are at risk due to land conversions into arable land, especially with regard to SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation) and SDG 15 (Life on Land) [13,14].Several studies investigated the impact of LULCC and climate change on water resources separately [3,15] or simultaneously [16,17]. The results of the studies differ due to several reasons e.g., the type of LULCC, the regional focus, or the time period and model chosen to simulate climate change. However, many studies indicate an increased exposure to hydro-climatic extremes in Eastern Africa [18][19][20][21]. This study exemplarily analyzes LULCC compared to climate change in the Kilombero Catchment in Tanzania and how these affect water resources. The catchment itself is subject to aforementioned LULCC [1,13] and pressure on land resources in the valley is fostered by government plans to implement the Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania (SAGCOT) [22], which is accompanied by a growing population and migration of pastoralists into the valley [23]. SAGCOT follows a green growth approach covering three development clusters in Kilombero, Ihemi, and Mbarali, comprising one third of the mainland of Tanzania [1,24,25]. On the one hand the key clusters are charac...

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

et al. 2019

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“…We examined research in coastal and island southeast Africa that contributes historical– ecology data to demonstrate, as others have on the East African mainland (Marchant et al. ), that historical‐ecology approaches offer critical information for effective conservation and sustainability. In the absence of more integrated, deeper time, and multiscalar perspectives, conservation scientists, development experts, and policy makers risk promoting strategies based on incomplete or biased data, particularly for periods that extend beyond African independence and the European colonial era.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Historical perspectives on contemporary human–environment dynamics in southeast Africa

Douglass

Walz

Morales

et al. 2019

Conservation Biology

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The human communities and ecosystems of island and coastal southeast Africa face significant and linked ecological threats. Socioecological conditions of concern to communities, governments, nongovernmental organizations, and researchers include declining agricultural productivity, deforestation, introductions of non-native flora and fauna, coastal erosion and sedimentation, damage to marine environments, illegal fishing, overfishing, waste pollution, salinization of freshwater supplies, and rising energy demands, among others. Human-environment challenges are connected to longer, often ignored, histories of social and ecological dynamics in the region. We argue that these challenges are more effectively understood and addressed within a longer-term historical ecology framework. We reviewed cases from Madagascar, coastal Kenya, and the Zanzibar Archipelago of fisheries, deforestation, and management of human waste to encourage increased engagement among historical ecologists, conservation scientists, and policy makers. These case studies demonstrate that by widening the types and time depths of data sets we used to investigate and address current socioecological challenges, our interpretations of their causes and strategies for their mitigation varied significantly.Perspectivas Históricas sobre las Dinámicas Contemporáneas entre Humanos y el Ambiente en el Sureste deÁfrica Resumen: Las comunidades humanas y los ecosistemas de las costas del sureste africano enfrentan amenazas ecológicas significativas y vinculadas. Las condiciones socio-ecológicas que preocupan a las comunidades, los gobiernos, las organizaciones no gubernamentales y a los investigadores incluyen la poductividad agrícola en declinación, la deforestación, la introducción de flora y fauna no nativa, la sedimentación y erosión costera, el daño hacia los ecosistemas marinos, la pesca ilegal, la sobrepesca, la contaminación por desechos, la salinización de las cuencas de agua dulce, y la creciente demanda de energía, entre otras. Los retos humanos -ecosistema están conectados con historias más largas, y frecuentemente ignoradas, de dinámicas sociales y ecológicas en la región. Argumentamos que estos retos se entienden y se tratan con mayor efectividad dentro de un marco de trabajo de ecología histórica con un periodo más largo. Revisamos casos de pesquerías, deforestación y manejo de desechos humanos en Madagascar, la costa de Kenia y el archipiélago de Zanzíbar para propiciar una mayor participación entre los ecologistas históricos, los científicos de la conservación, y los * email: kdouglass@psu.edu Article impact statement: Past human-environment dynamics are key to addressing today's threats to livelihoods and ecosystems in island and coastal southeast Africa. Douglass et al. 261legisladores. Estos estudios de caso demuestran que al ampliar los tipos y la temporalidad de los conjuntos de datos que usamos para investigar y tratar los retos socio-ecológicos contemporáneos, nuestras interpretaciones de las causas de estos retos y las estrategias para...

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“…In the majority of sub-Saharan Africa, the most important change in human-environment relations of the precolonial era arose in the context of the steady southward and eastward expansion of early Bantu-language speakers, frequently referred to as the Bantu expansion (Bostoen et al 2013de Luna 2017;Grollemund et al 2015;Rowold, Perez-Benedico, Stojkovic, Garcia-Bertrand and Herrera 2016;Russell, Silva and Steel 2014). This period is characterized by the establishment of a fully developed suite of domesticated crops and iron metallurgy to areas previously occupied by hunter-gatherers and sometimes pastoralists (Marchant et al 2018). This means that, particularly in southern Africa, there is a clear distinction between the Late Stone Age and the Iron Age that correlates with land-use practices (Huffman and Schoeman 2011;Mitchell 2013a;Pwiti 1996), though the term 'Iron Age' is increasingly falling out of favor (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Untitled

2019

Preprint

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Many societal and environmental changes occurred between the 2nd millennium BC and the middle of the 2nd millennium AD in western Africa. Key amongst these were changes in land use due to the spread and development of agricultural strategies, which may have had widespread consequences for the climate, hydrology, biodiversity, and ecosystem services of the region. Quantification of these land-use influences and potential feedbacks between human and natural systems is controversial, however, in part because the archaeological and historical record is highly fragmented in time and space. To improve our understanding of how humans contributed to the development of African landscapes, we developed an atlas of landuse practices in western Africa for nine time-windows over the period 1800 BC-AD 1500. The maps are based on a broad synthesis of archaeological, archaeobotanical, archaeozoological, historical, linguistic, genetic, and ethnographic data, and present land use in 12 basic categories. The main differences between categories is the relative reliance on, and variety of, domesticated plant and animal species utilized, and the energy invested in cultivating or keeping them. The maps highlight the irregular and frequently non-linear trajectory of land-use change in the prehistory of western Africa. Representing an original attempt to produce rigorous spatial synthesis from diverse sources, the atlas will be useful for a range of studies of human-environment interactions in the past, and highlight major spatial and temporal gaps in data that may guide future field studies.

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Drivers and trajectories of land cover change in East Africa: Human and environmental interactions from 6000 years ago to present

Cited by 151 publications

References 524 publications

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

Historical perspectives on contemporary human–environment dynamics in southeast Africa

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Drivers and trajectories of land cover change in East Africa: Human and environmental interactions from 6000 years ago to present

Cited by 151 publications

References 524 publications

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

The Impact of Land Use/Land Cover Change (LULCC) on Water Resources in a Tropical Catchment in Tanzania under Different Climate Change Scenarios

Historical perspectives on contemporary human–environment dynamics in southeast Africa

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Drivers and trajectories of land cover change in East Africa: Human and environmental interactions from 6000 years ago to present