Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-21T02:12:00.608Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Fifty years of deforestation and forest fragmentation in Madagascar

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 January 2008

GRADY J. HARPER ,
MARC K. STEININGER ,
COMPTON J. TUCKER ,
DANIEL JUHN  and
FRANK HAWKINS
GRADY J. HARPER*
Affiliation:
Conservation International, 2011 Crystal Drive suite 500, Arlington VA 22202, USA
MARC K. STEININGER
Affiliation:
Conservation International, 2011 Crystal Drive suite 500, Arlington VA 22202, USA
COMPTON J. TUCKER
Affiliation:
Code 923NASA/GSFC, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771, USA
DANIEL JUHN
Affiliation:
Conservation International, 2011 Crystal Drive suite 500, Arlington VA 22202, USA
FRANK HAWKINS
Affiliation:
Conservation International, 2011 Crystal Drive suite 500, Arlington VA 22202, USA Conservation International, BP 5178, Antananarivo 101, Madagascar
*
*Correspondence: Grady Harper Tel: +1 703 341 2761 Fax: +1 703 979 2514 e-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Tropical deforestation is a key contributor to species extinction and climate change, yet the extent of tropical forests and their rate of destruction and degradation through fragmentation remain poorly known. Madagascar's forests are among the most biologically rich and unique in the world but, in spite of longstanding concern about their destruction, past estimates of forest cover and deforestation have varied widely. Analysis of aerial photographs (c. 1953) and Landsat images (c. 1973, c. 1990 and c. 2000) indicates that forest cover decreased by almost 40% from the 1950s to c. 2000, with a reduction in ‘core forest’ > 1 km from a non-forest edge of almost 80%. This forest destruction and degradation threaten thousands of species with extinction. Country-wide coverage of high-resolution validated forest cover and deforestation data enables the precise monitoring of trends in habitat extent and fragmentation critical for assessment of species' conservation status.

Keywords

deforestationforestfragmentationMadagascarremote sensing
Type
Papers
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 34 , Issue 4 , December 2007 , pp. 325 - 333
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Achard, F., Eva, H.D., Stibig, H.J., Mayaux, P., Gallego, J., Richards, T. & Malingreau, J.P. (2002) Determination of deforestation rates of the world's humid tropical forests. Science 297 (5583): 999–1002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blasco, F. (1965) Notice de la carte de Madagascar. In: Notice de la carte de Madagascar, ed. Humbert, H. & Cours Darne, G., pp. 4–13. Puducherry, India: Section Scientifique et Technique de L'Institut Francais de Pondichéry.Google Scholar
Brooks, T.M., Pimm, S.L. & Oyugi, J.O. (1999) Time lag between deforestation and bird extinction in tropical forest fragments. Conservation Biology 13 (5): 1140–1150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cochrane, M.A. (2001) Synergistic interactions between habitat fragmentation and fire in evergreen tropical forests. Conservation Biology 15 (6): 1515–1521.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cowlishaw, G. (1999) predicting the pattern of decline of African primate diversity: an extinction debt from historical deforestation. Conservation Biology 13 (5): 1183–1193.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cullen, L., Bodmer, R.E. & Padua, C.V. (2000) Effects of hunting in habitat fragments of the Atlantic forests, Brazil. Biological Conservation 95 (1): 49–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dufils, J.M. (2003) Remaining forest cover. In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., pp. 88–96. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Enserink, M. (1999) Biological invaders sweep in. Science 285 (5435): 1834–1836.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
FAO (2000) Global Forest Resources Assessment 2000. Rome, Italy: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.Google Scholar
Faramalala, M.H. (1988) Etude de la végétation de Madagascar à l'aide des données spatiales. Doctoral Thesis, L'Universite Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France.Google Scholar
Ferreira, L.V. & Laurance, W.F. (1997) Effects of forest fragmentation on mortality and damage of selected trees in Central Amazonia. Conservation Biology 11 (3): 797–801.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gade, D.W. (1996) Deforestation and its effects in highland Madagascar. Mountain Research and Development 16 (2): 101–116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garbutt, N. (1999) Mammals of Madagascar. New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Gautier, L. & Goodman, S.M. (2003) Introduction to the flora of Madagascar. In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., pp. 229–250. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Glaw, F. & Vences, M. (2003) Introduction to amphibians. In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., pp. 883–898. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Green, G.M. & Sussman, R.W. (1990) Deforestation history of the eastern rain forests of Madagascar from satellite images. Science 248 (4952): 212–215.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harris, L.D. (1984) The Fragmented Forest: Island Biogeographic Theory and the Preservation of Biological Diversity. Chicago, IL, USA: The University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkins, A.F.A. & Goodman, S.M. (2003) In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., pp. 1019–1044. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Humbert, H. & Cours Darne, G., eds (1965) Notice de la Carte Madagascar. Puducherry, India: Section Scientifique et Technique de L'Institut Francais de Pondichéry.Google Scholar
IEFN (1996) Inventaire Ecologique Forestier National. Antananarivo, Madagascar: Ministère de l'Environnement.Google Scholar
Jarosz, L. (1993) Defining and explaining tropical deforestation: shifting cultivation and population-growth in colonial Madagascar (1896–1940). Economic Geography 69 (4): 366–379.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kapos, V. (1989) Effects of isolation on the water status of forest patches in the Brazilian Amazon. Journal of Tropical Ecology 5 (2): 173–185.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kull, C.A. (2000) Deforestation, erosion, and fire: degradation myths in the environmental history of Madagascar. Environment and History 6 (4): 423–450.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langrand, O. & Wilmé, L. (1997) Effects of forest fragmentation on extinction patterns of the endemic avifauna on the central high plateau of Madagascar. In: Natural Change and Human Impact in Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Patterson, B.D., pp. 280–308. Washington, DC, USA: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Lovejoy, T.E. (1997) Biodiversity: what is it? In: Biodiversity II. Understanding and Protecting Our Biological Resources, ed. Reaka-Kudla, M.L., Wilson, D.E. & Wilson, E.O., pp. 7–14. Washington, DC, USA: Joseph Henry Press.Google Scholar
Mayaux, P., Gond, V. & Bartholome, E. (2000) A near-real time forest-cover map of Madagascar derived from SPOT-4 VEGETATION data. International Journal of Remote Sensing 21 (16): 3139–3144.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayaux, P., Holmgren, P., Achard, F., Eva, H., Stibig, H.-J. & Branthomme, A. (2005) Tropical forest cover change in the 1990s and options for future monitoring. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series B-Biological Sciences 360 (1454): 373–384.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Myers, N., Mittermeier, R.A., Mittermeier, C.G., da Fonseca, G.A.B. & Kent, J. (2000) Biodiversity hotspots for conservation priorities. Nature 403 (6772): 853–858.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rakotosamimanana, B. (2003) Foreword. In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., p. xi. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Raxworthy, C.J. (2003) Introduction to the reptiles. In: The Natural History of Madagascar, ed. Goodman, S.M. & Benstead, J.P., pp. 934–949. Chicago, IL, USA: University of Chicago Press.Google ScholarPubMed
Schatz, G.E. & Lescot, M. (2003) Gazetteer to Malagasy botanical collecting localities [www document]. URL http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/Research/madagascar/gazetteer/Google Scholar
Skole, D. & Tucker, C.J. (1993) Tropical deforestation and habitat fragmentation in the Amazon: satellite data from 1978 to 1988. Science 260 (5116): 1905–1910.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Steininger, M.K., Tucker, C.J., Townshend, J.R.G., Killeen, T.J., Desch, A., Bell, V. & Ersts, P. (2001) Tropical deforestation in the Bolivian Amazon. Environmental Conservation 28 (2): 127–134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Townshend, J.R.G. & Justice, C.O. (1988) Selecting the spatial resolution of satellite sensors required for global monitoring of land transformations. International Journal of Remote Sensing 9 (2): 187–236.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tucker, C.J. & Townshend, J.R.G. (2000) Strategies for monitoring tropical deforestation using satellite data. International Journal of Remote Sensing 21 (6–7): 1461–1471.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tucker, C.J., Grant, D.M. & Dykstra, J.D. (2004) NASA's global orthorectified Landsat data set. Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing 70 (3): 313–322.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UNPF (2004) State of World Population 2004. New York, NY, USA: United Nations Population Fund.Google Scholar
Vallan, D. (2000) Influence of forest fragmentation on amphibian diversity in the nature reserve of Ambohitantely, highland Madagascar. Biological Conservation 96 (1): 31–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Watson, J.E.M., Whittaker, R.J. & Dawson, T.P. (2004) Avifaunal responses to habitat fragmentation in the threatened littoral forests of south-eastern Madagascar. Journal of Biogeography 31: 1791–1807.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Watson, R.T., Noble, I.R., Bolin, B., Ravindranath, N.H., Verardo, D.J. & Dokken, D.J., eds (2000) Land Use, Land-Use Change, and Forestry: Summary for Policy Makers. Geneva, Switzerland: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.Google Scholar