Volume 221, 1 April 2016, Pages 115–124
Leonith Hinojosaa, , , ,
- a Georges Lemaître Earth and Climate Research Centre, Earth and Life Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Place Louis Pasteur 3, bte L4.03.08, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium
- b INRA Ecodevelopment, Site Agroparc, CS 40509, 84914 Avignon Cedex 9, France
- c School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences and Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University, 473 Via Ortega, Stanford, CA 94305, United States
- Received 7 August 2015, Revised 17 December 2015, Accepted 19 January 2016, Available online 5 February 2016
Highlights
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- Differences within mountain regions are significant for land abandonment patterns.
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- In 1990–2006 grasslands abandonment in the Alps occurred less in high mountains.
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- CAP payments were not fully effective in reducing grasslands abandonment.
Abstract
Land
use change studies increasingly integrate geographic factors to explain
uneven patterns of land abandonment. For mountain areas, biophysical
factors, such as altitude, and economic factors, such as distance from
core areas of economic and urban development, have been associated with
agricultural land abandonment. These interpretations have led to
agricultural and land use policies based on compensatory measures to
maintain economic activity in mountain regions without much
consideration of the intra-regional differences in agricultural land
abandonment patterns. This paper argues that such differences are
significant and should be taken into account in land use and rural
policy design. Based on GIS estimations of land cover change for the
1990–2006 period and regression analysis of socio-economic attributes
for 417 mountain municipalities in Provence-Alps-Côte d’Azur in Southern
France, our research shows that high altitude grasslands are less
likely to be abandoned than those located in lower altitude areas. This
result is counter-intuitive given the understanding that remoteness and
biophysical constraints are often associated with low land rents,
therefore with higher levels of abandonment. Our findings also suggest
that grassland abandonment is caused by a combination of both local and
regional/global factors. European Union policies for maintaining
agricultural activity in marginal areas were not fully effective in
reducing grasslands abandonment.
Keywords
- Mountain agriculture;
- Remoteness;
- Land-use modelling
Copyright © 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.
