Abstract
The impact of fire use and hazard in frontier settlement is a critical environmental concern that has been historically overshadowed by deforestation issues- and thus underexamined at local and regional scales by social scientists. Consequently, conceptual frameworks of LUCC change consider fire use as an outcome of land use decisions and neglect the capacity of burning choices to influence these decisions and subsequent land cover change. This paper examines the relationship of settlement, land use, and fire use. It considers recent LUCC frameworks, and then uses household surveys on fire use practices to discuss how the study of fire use can contribute to understanding frontier landscape change. Planting decisions, settlement history, location desires, and burning logistics work in combination to influence burning choices and thus LUCC.
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Sorrensen, C. Contributions of Fire Use Study to Land Use/Cover Change Frameworks: Understanding Landscape Change in Agricultural Frontiers. Human Ecology 32, 395–420 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:HUEC.0000043513.47895.a8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:HUEC.0000043513.47895.a8