Depopulation of rural landscapes exacerbates fire activity in the western Amazon.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Uriarte M
PROVIDER: S-EPMC3535597 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Dec
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Depopulation of rural landscapes exacerbates fire activity in the western Amazon.
Uriarte María M Pinedo-Vasquez Miquel M DeFries Ruth S RS Fernandes Katia K Gutierrez-Velez Victor V Baethgen Walter E WE Padoch Christine C
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20121210 52
Destructive fires in Amazonia have occurred in the past decade, leading to forest degradation, carbon emissions, impaired air quality, and property damage. Here, we couple climate, geospatial, and province-level census data, with farmer surveys to examine the climatic, demographic, and land use factors associated with fire frequency in the Peruvian Amazon from 2000 to 2010. Although our results corroborate previous findings elsewhere that drought and proximity to roads increase fire frequency, t ...[more]
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