SIMMONS, WALKER – Spatial Patterns of Frontier Settlement: Balancing Conservation and Development
Cynthia Simmons, Robert Walker, Stephen Perz, Eugenio Arima, Stephen Aldrich, Marcellus Caldas
Article first published online: MAR 2016 Journal of Latin American Geography
DOI: 10.1353/lag.2016.0011
ABSTRACT: Amazonian deforestation has declined recently, but Brazil’s infrastructure plans continue to target the region. In the interest of sustainable development, this article engages the spatial discourses in conservation planning and landscape ecology. It does so by addressing fishbone fragmentation, commonly observed in development frontiers in Brazil. The article demonstrates the importance of road-building by private citizens as key to explaining this particular development geometry. It also suggests that fishbone fragmentation may promote human welfare, and at the same time provide a porous disturbance “filter” with vegetative corridors linking areas of low disturbance across areas of human occupation, thereby enhancing connectivity to support biodiversity conservation.
Read the full publication at Journal of Latin American Geography