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Loggers and Forest Fragmentation: Behavioral Models of Road Building in the Amazon BasinAlthough a large literature now exists on the drivers of tropical deforestation, less is known about its spatial manifestation. This is a critical shortcoming in our knowledge base since the spatial pattern of land-cover change and forest fragmentation, in particular, strongly affect biodiversity. The purpose of this article is to consider emergent patterns of road networks, the initial proximate cause of fragmentation in tropical forest frontiers. Specifically, we address the road-building processes of loggers who are very active in the Amazon landscape. To this end, we develop an explanation of road expansions, using a positive approach combining a theoretical model of economic behavior with geographic information systems (GIs) software in order to mimic the spatial decisions of road builders. We simulate two types of road extensions commonly found in the Amazon basin in a region: showing the fishbone pattern of fragmentation. Although our simulation results are only partially successful, they call attention to the role of multiple agents in the landscape, the importance of legal and institutional constraints on economic behavior, and the power of GIs as a research tool.
Document ID
20070022829
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Arima, Eugenio Y.
(Michigan State Univ. East Lansing, MI, United States)
Walker, Robert T.
(Michigan State Univ. East Lansing, MI, United States)
Perz, Stephen G.
(Florida Univ. Gainesville, FL, United States)
Caldas, Marcellus
(Michigan State Univ. East Lansing, MI, United States)
Date Acquired
August 23, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 2005
Publication Information
Publication: Annals of the Association of American Geographers
Volume: 94
Issue: 3
Subject Category
Earth Resources And Remote Sensing
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NCC5-694
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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