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Land‐cover change and human–environment interactions in a rural cultural landscape in South Africa
Author(s) -
GIANNECCHINI MONICA,
TWINE WAYNE,
VOGEL COLEEN
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
geographical journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.071
H-Index - 64
eISSN - 1475-4959
pISSN - 0016-7398
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-4959.2007.00227.x
Subject(s) - geography , woodland , livelihood , human settlement , land cover , cultural landscape , land use , natural resource , population growth , population , diversification (marketing strategy) , ecology , agriculture , business , demography , archaeology , marketing , sociology , biology
This paper presents an historical analysis (1974–97) of associations between land‐cover change and socio‐economic factors for three villages in a former bantustan region of South Africa. The notion of social–ecological systems is used as the conceptual framework for this analysis, in which the former bantustan region of Bushbuckridge is posited as a cultural landscape. The local landscape showed distinctive modifications over the study period, broad trends including the growth of human settlements and the decrease in woodland cover. However, changes were not uniform across sites, and the direction and magnitude of changes in land cover were often nonlinear and site‐specific. Analysis of associations between biophysical and socio‐economic changes at different scales revealed a range of important interacting forces such as population growth, drought, shortages of land, grazing and wood resources, weakening institutional governance of natural resources, and the diversification of livelihood strategies, including the sale of fuelwood, concurrent with declining employment security and cattle ownership. Evidence suggests a possible erosion of resilience in these social–ecological systems at various scales, with important implications for socio‐economic development and sustainable resource management.