Applied Geography 26 (2006) 6185 www.elsevier.

com/locate/apgeog

Aridity and desertication: Exploring environmental hazards in Jachal, Argentina

Susana B. Adamo a,*, Kelley A. Crews-Meyer b
a

Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina, 302E University Square East, 123 West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill, NC 27516, USA b Department of Geography and the Environment, University of Texas, 210 W. 24th #334, MC A3100, Austin, TX 78712, USA

Abstract This paper explores environmental hazards, more specically desertication processes, in an area of west central Argentina, addressing the combined inuence of the physical framework and the long lasting human settlement and use of natural resources. It is based upon the analysis of remotely sensed using vegetation indices, image differentiation, change detection, and pattern metrics. The results indicate a net decreased in the amount of vegetation between 1973 and 2001, and increasing fragmentation of vegetation classes. This is interpreted as a sign of the presence of land degradation processes likely linked to human activities in the areas of irrigated farming, grazing, rewood gathering and population settlement. q 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Arid lands; Desertication; Aridity; Argentina; Environmental hazards; Remote sensing; Natural resources management

Introduction Desertication represents one of the most threatening environmental hazards due to the large amount of people and land at risk1. Although numbers vary across the literature, it is estimated that desertication directly affects one-third of the Earths land and 250 million people, most of them in developing countries; even a higher number could be potentially affected (Clarke & Noin, 1998; Murray, Burke, Tunstall, & Gilruth, 1999; UNCCD, 2004).
* Corresponding author. Tel.: C1 919 966 6835; fax: C1 919 962 7217. E-mail address: sbadamo@email.unc.edu (S. B. Adamo). 1 Dened in a broad sense, environmental hazards include all those physical agents, events, objective conditions, and processes in the environment that create threats to livelihoods or lives, regardless of their genesis (Hewitt, 1997:25). The concept takes account of processes originated from natural resource management issues (e.g. deforestation) as well as of potentially dangerous natural ecosystem dynamics (e.g. earthquakes).

0143-6228/$ - see front matter q 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.apgeog.2005.09.001

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Desertication is the label for land degradation in arid, semiarid, and dry sub-humid areas, collectively called drylands. Land degradation is dened as the reduction or loss of the biological or economic productivity and complexity of agricultural land (including rainfed cropland, irrigated cropland, range and pasture), forests and woodlands (United Nations, 1994:4-5). The term implies a negative change with respect to previous environmental conditions, often implicitly considered as the normal or desirable state of affairs in the ecosystem in terms of its use and management (Blaikie & Brookeld, 1987). Desertication is the outcome of different processes, including climatic variation and human activities (United Nations, 1994:4). Regarding climatic variation, moisture deciency or aridity is the most common climatic criteria used for the denition and classication of drylands, and is caused when water losses (evaporation and transpiration, referred collectively as evapotranspiration) exceed water inputs (precipitation) (Strahler & Strahler, 1992:164). Low and irregular rainfall, high evapotranspiration, and cyclical droughts contribute to this deciency.2 Human activities leading to land degradation in drylands are related to land uses and habitation patterns, and include: (a) soil erosion caused by wind and/or water; (b) deterioration of the physical, chemical and biological, or economic properties of soil; and (c) long-term loss of natural vegetation (United Nations, 1994:5). An immediate consequence of the United Nations denition of desertication is that its understanding requires taking into account two different but related aspects: (1) the natural dynamics, average characteristics, and variations of the physical and biological components of arid and semiarid environments, their evolution over time, and their spatial diversity; and (2) how populations have historically used the natural resources in a given area, and what kind of environmental problems may stem from different forms of land use and management. A caveat in considering desertication is that, because the ecological and social dynamics and variability of drylands are not that well known, the determination of what states of the ecosystem should be regarded as problematic in terms of productivity is not an easy task (Agnew, 2002; Dregne, 2002; Thomas & Middleton, 1994). The carrying capacity of drylands is generally low because of the reduced availability of water derived from aridity, and this scarcity in turn affects the availability, use, and management of other natural capital components, e.g. land and biomass (Knerr, 1998:213). In addition, desertication is a process characterized by cumulative changes or slow-onset disruption (International Organization for Migration, 1992:12), making it difcult to identify its initial stages. In this paper, we seek to contribute to the knowledge of the environmental and social dynamics of drylands, by exploring environmental hazards related to aridity and desertication in the department of Jachal, an arid area located in the province of San Juan in the west of 3 Argentina . The general objective is twofold. We intend to address environmental change, identifying and locating land degradation processes from 1973 to 2001. Also, we intend to establish the relation between these processes, the natural dynamics of the ecosystem, and human activities and settlement.
Dening aridity involves the calculation of the ratio of precipitation to potential evapotranspiration (P/PET), also called an aridity index, which should lie between 0.05 and 0.65 for an area to be considered dryland. There are different ways of deriving this index from climatic data, but the underlying principles are basically the same (Middleton & Thomas, 1997:2; Noin & Clarke, 1998:2; UNEP, 1992:2; United Nations, 1994:5; UNSO, 1997:5). Other denitions of drylands take into account only the amount of annual rainfall. The limit between sub-humid and humid areas is usually set at 800 mm (Little, 1994). 3 In Argentina, departments are third level administrative units, after country and province, similar to counties in the US.
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The structure of the paper is as follows. After a brief overview of arid lands in Argentina, we introduce the study area, including environmental conditions and dynamics, natural resource management, and documented environmental problems in the department. This will set a baseline or starting point for discussing environmental change. In Section 3, we describe the data and methods used, followed by the presentation of the results of the remote sensing analyses. Sections 5 and 6 offers the discussion and conclusions of the study. Aridity and desertication in Argentina Although Argentinas image is generally linked to the green prairies of the Pampas, it actually may be dened as an arid country. An estimated 70% of its area is in arid, semiarid, or drysubhumid lands, where only 12% of the countrys water resources are located. Almost 30% of its population lived in those areas in 1991, and drylands represent 50% of the agricultural value (Abraham, 2003; Deng, 2000; Dregne & Chou, 1992; Murray et al., 1999). A substantial amount of the land in Argentinas drylands suffers erosive process classied as moderate or severe, resulting in declining agriculture productivity and deteriorating living conditions (Abraham, 2003). The population in areas under desertication amounts to almost seven million people or 19% of the countrys population, and poverty and indigence in these areas are consistently higher than the national averages (CEPAL/GTZ, 2003). In the province of San Juan, where the study area is located, environmental degradation is considered signicant. It is attributed to a combination of both environmental characteristics (i.e. arid climate and highly varied topography) and natural resources management issues (notably water management, land ownership and lack of modern technology) (PROSA, 1988; SAGyP & CFA, 1995). The study area The department of Jachal is located in the north of the province of San Juan, in the heart of Argentinas drylands4. Its area is 14,749 km2 (5,590 square miles), and it had a total population of 20,898 in 20015. The proportion of rural population was 48%, remarkably higher that the national percentage (11%). The only urban centre is San Jose de Jachal, founded in 1751 and a small city of 10,901 inhabitants in 2001. The rest of the population is distributed in small rural towns and villages in the main and secondary irrigation areas, along the rivers. Very few people live dispersed in the countryside, along the main roads, and in the puestos, temporary grazing settlements in the Precordillera natural pastures. The locations of the population centers and puestos are displayed in Fig. 1. The environmental framework Located within the Arid Diagonal of South America, aridity is the dening characteristic of Jachals ecosystem, and the main ecological limiting factors are related to water availability. The average total annual precipitation oscillated between 100 and 200 mm for the 19411990 series,
4 Jachal is the name of the department (administrative unit), the main river, the only urban area, and the main irrigation district. 5 This is the date of the last population census.

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Fig. 1. The Department of Jachal. The geomorphology of Jachal is complex, including the Precordillera on the west, the Sierras Pampeanas on the east, their foothills and piedmonts, the intermountain valley where the irrigation districts of Jachal, Niquivil and Tucunuco are located, and the plains of the east that form the desolated Travesa of Ampacama. Source: Authors elaboration, after Lizana (2001).

which places the department well into the denition of an arid area6. The evapotranspiration for the same period averaged more than 1000 mm (Cornejo, 1997), yielding an aridity index (ratio of precipitation to potential evapotranspiration) of approximately 0.09. This score not only classies this area as arid, but even borders on hyper-arid according to the UNSO classication. In addition to this, precipitation distribution along the year is irregular, concentrated in a few months or even weeks during the summer (JanuaryMarch). Wide interannual variations in rainfall are common and there are also spatial variations due to differences in altitude, geomorphology, and relief orientation across the large area of the department. High evapotranspiration is stimulated by the hot summers, temperate winters and wide daily temperature uctuations that also characterize the climate of Jachal. Most of the year is frost free, representing a potential advantage in the growth and marketing of vegetables such as onions and tomatoes (Allub & Guzman, 2000). The constant water decit makes agriculture impossible without irrigation, and also poses a heavy burden on the population in terms of water
6 Using the precipitation criterion, drylands include the following zones: (a) sub-humid, 5001000 mm, (b) semiarid, 250500 mm, and (c) arid, 0250 mm (Strahler & Strahler, 1992:146).

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120 110 100 90 80 70 cms 60 50 40 30 20 10 apr apr apr apr apr jan oct jan oct jan oct jan oct jan oct jul jul jul jul jul 0

1940-44

months 1967-72

Average

Fig. 2. Jachal river: average monthly discharge, and discharge in humid (19401944) and dry (19671972) years. Source: Calculations based on data from the Direccion Provincial de Hidraulica of San Juan. The measure point was the stream gauging station of Pachimoco, near San Jose de Jachal. Note: CMS stands for cubic meter per second.

availability for household needs such as drinking and cleaning. However, the small amount of local precipitation is sufcient to maintain the native vegetation, which represents both a forage resource for small goat herds and rewood for the human population. Water availability is tied to surface watercourses, and permanent rivers are scarce. The largest perennial stream is the Jachal river, a typical allochthonous7 river (see location in Fig. 1). Average monthly discharge varies between 8 and 9 m3/sec (cm) (Allub & Guzman, 2000; Pannocchia, 1979), quite low for being the areas most reliable water source. There are strong seasonal variations in discharge, as can be observed in Fig. 2. Summer months represent the peak discharge season while winter months are the low discharge period, a pattern derived from the rivers source, snowmelt in the Arid Andes. The river discharge also presents strong interannual variations. While average discharge for January is 15 cm, in January of 1942 the river discharged 144 cm and in January of 1971, 3.40 cm. A particular problem related to the Jachal river is its high salinity (particularly sodium and boron), which adds to the ecological constraints, reducing yields and limiting viable crops to those tolerant to boron (onions, alfalfa, wheat, corn and olives).8 After water availability, soils are the most crucial natural resource for agriculture. In Jachal, soil quality is not optimal due to the climatic constraints: soil formation is slower in arid environments because of water and organic matter scarcity, and the resultant soils are generally thin and of low
7 Allochthonous applies to watercourses whose source and upper reaches are located in a different and generally moister environment than the one where they end, and which receive no or very few tributaries when they pass through arid lands, being greatly reduced by evaporation and often by the use of their waters for irrigation (Mainguet, 1999:85). 8 Boron concentration reaches 4.5 mg/litre when the maximum limit has been set at 3.75 mg/litre (Centro Regional del Agua Subterranea, 1972).

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Fig. 3. Soils of the Department of Jachal. Soils in Jachal have been classied into three groups of the order Entisols. Torriuvents are soils of arid climate that are not ooded frequently or for a long time. Torriorthents, located in the piedmonts surrounding the central oasis, include dry or salty soils on moderate or high slopes. Torripsaments present a sandy texture and low water retention capacity (INTA/Aeroterra, 1995; Strahler & Strahler, 1992). Source: Authors elaboration after INTA (1990) and INTA/Aeroterra (1995).

agricultural potential (Mainguet, 1999:46). Fig. 3 displays soil distribution in Jachal. A substantial amount of the department area is categorized as rock, with little to no soil layer and consequently not suitable for agriculture purposes. In the rest of the department, soils have been classied within the order Entisols, incomplete soils due to the physical characteristics of the environment: topography, erosion processes, aridity, and scarce organic matter (INTA, 1990; INTA/Aeroterra, 1995; Strahler & Strahler, 1992:46362, 58182). Because these characteristics and processes vary across Jachals area, three groups of Entisols are found: torriuvents, torriorthents and torripsaments. They exhibit variations in their capacity to sustain agricultural activities, always within the overall low productivity that characterizes dryland soils. These variations are related to differences in chemical composition, to micro-level combinations of climate and geomorphology, and in some cases to decades of irrigated agriculture. As eld-based measurements of soil capacity for sustaining agriculture do not exist for this area, an indirect measurement is the productivity index or PI. This indicator is interpreted as a proportion of the highest potential yield or productivity of typical crops in the area. In other words, (100-PI) is the percentage of decline in the optimal yield due to some characteristic or limitation (INTA, 1990; INTA/Aeroterra, 1995).9 PIs are generally low in the department,
9

The productivity index PI is calculated taking in account climatic factors (such as temperature and precipitation) (H), and soil factors (such as drainage D, depth P, texture T, salinity Sa, organic matter M, erosion E, etc.). These factors are included in a multiplicative parameter: PIZH!D!P!T. and so on. The climatic factor (H) for San Juan was set in 65 due to aridity, which in turn resulted in PIs below 35 for the provinces soils (INTA, 1990).

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but the index presents wide differences by type of soil and location. Torriuvents, torripsaments and torriorthents show PIs of 33, 18 and 4, respectively. Within these averages, soils located in the western or mountainous portion of the study area have lower PIs regardless of type, due to the effect of slopes and gravity on soil formation. Inuenced by water deciencies and variability, and soil conditions, the natural vegetation cover is a combination of sparse open woods, shrub steppes, and wide patches of bare soil, arrange in an irregular spatial pattern that follows micro-level changes in ecological conditions (Cabrera, 1958). It corresponds to the oristic Province of Monte, and displays a combination of open woods and shrub steppes identied respectively by two species, algarrobo (Prosopis spp.) and jarilla (Larrea spp.). Species are xerophytes well adapted to aridity, and some of them are adapted to live in particular niches within the general arid environment (rocks, sand, clay, salt and marshes) (Cabrera, 1958; Morello, 1958). Halophytes (salt tolerant species) like jume (Allenrolfea vaginata) and zampa (Atriplex lampa) could be considered biological markers for land degradation, since they usually replace xerophytes in areas of waterlogging and acute salinization (Centro Regional de Agua Subterranea, 1972; Kiesling, 1994). The use and (Mis)management of natural resources Water, land, and vegetation cover represent the natural resource base of Jachals economy and households livelihoods and consumption. Over time, different environmental problems have been linked to the use and management of these natural resources through, for example, irrigated farming and ranching, grazing in natural pastures, and gathering of rewood for heating and cooking. A number of processes in Jachal could eventually be linked to desertication or land degradation, among them salinization of soils and water, waterlogging, and deforestation (Allub & Guzman, 2000; Pannocchia, 1979). It has been argued that this degradation has had negative economic effects for the department (PROSA, 1988), and local authorities are now involved in the recuperation of soils affected by salinization, waterlogging and nutrient depletion (Davire de Musri & Malberti de Lopez Aragon, 1999). Salinization as outcome of irrigated farming Despite the important ecological constraints, irrigated agriculture and livestock raising (cattle, sheep, and goats) have been the most important economic activities in this department since the mid-19th century. Consequently, the major and probably older human modication of the natural environment in Jachal has been the implementation of irrigated farming. The area systematized for irrigation represented 1.2% of the total area of the department, and is subdivided into ve irrigation districts: Jachal (16,437 Has), Niquivil (1,500 Has), Tucunuco (1,030 Has), Mogna (1,500 Has) and Huaco (1,600 Has). The location of the districts is displayed in Fig. 1. Irrigated farms represented 89% of the total number of farms in 1988 (1,081), and all of them used surface sources for irrigation (INDEC, 1990). The irrigation system also distributes drinking water using a different network. In case of water scarcity and conicting needs, domestic consumption has priority over irrigated farming. Although there are about 22,000 ha with water rights in Jachal, the actual area under cultivation has been consistently smaller, and present wide interannual variations. For example, it was 7,161 ha in 1960, 6,440 in 1988, and 2,401 in 1992. Both the small percentage of systematized land actually farmed and the annual variations in crop acreage are related to water management and distribution in three interrelated ways. First, it is not possible to honor all water rights. The Water Code of San Juan establishes that each farm with water rights is entitled to

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Table 1 Distribution (%) of productive and unproductive land by irrigation district District Jachal (31,339 Has) Huaco (4,333 Has) Mogna (3,218 Has) Niquivil/Tucunuco (1,588 Has) Total (40,478 Has) Source: After Harza de Argentina (1971). Productive land (%) 40 41 35 16 39 Unproductive land due to Salinity (%) 19 35 31 74 24 Slope (%) 41 23 34 11 37 Urban use (%) 0.5 0.5 0.4

1 litre of water/sec/ha. However, there is not enough water for everyone with water rights in the districts of Jachal, and an irrigation coefcient is applied. This coefcient indicates what proportion of the amount xed by law can practically be served by the real river discharge. For Jachal, the coefcient is approximately 0.5, which reduces the amount of water to 0.5 litre/sec/ha, and it can be even lower in cases of hydrological crisis or emergency such as drought. Second, the already mentioned naturally high salinity of the Jachal river translates into farmers requiring 30% more water than normally needed in order to wash the soils. Third, the use of gravity-based irrigation technology, compounded with inherent topographic steepness, makes irrigation efciency at the plot level less than 50% (in other words, more that 50% of the water is wasted). Efciency at the level of the distribution network is also low due to the fact that most of the ditches (212 km out of 300 km) are permeable and water is lost through seepage.10 In short, there have a been an underutilization of land resources, compounded with a water management style that leaves the soils critically exposed to deterioration in case of water shortages (which are quite common in the area). Irrigated farming in drylands is commonly associated with salinization (Adamo, 1997; Mainguet, 1999; Thomas & Middleton, 1993), and Jachal is no exception11. In the irrigated areas of the department, salinization is the outcome of the natural conditions of water and soils in combination with inadequate forms of management. One of the most common factors in increasing the risk and rate of salinization is poor drainage. In 1994 there were 300 km of irrigation ditches but only 44 km of drainage ditches, rendering a ratio of 0.15: for every 100 m of irrigation ditches there are only 15 m of drainage ditches. This imbalanced ratio means that it is easier to transport water to the plot than to take it out. The magnitude of salinization seems to vary from district to district, although empirical data is scarce.Table 1 displays the distribution of potential agricultural land for the different irrigation districts in 1971, based on a report elaborated by Harza de Argentina. Out of 40,478 ha of potential agricultural land, only 51% could be considered productive. There was a wide variation in the proportion of productive land in each locality, but in every case it was less that 50% of the total available agricultural land. Overall, salinization affected 24% of the potentially suitable land, being lower in Jachal and higher in Niquivil and Tucunuco. This report is important
Alfredo Estevez, director of the local Rural Extension Agency of the National Institute of Agriculture Technology, personal communication, 2001. 11 Salinization is a form of chemical degradation related to the accumulation of soluble salts. It is associated with both natural processes (for example, excessive evaporation in arid climates) and human activities (for example, decient irrigation techniques). Among other consequences, salinization reduces biological activity, the content of organic matter in the soils, and the natural or cultivated vegetation cover (Mainguet, 1999:235).
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because it establishes a suitable starting point to explore environmental change in the irrigated areas between 1973 and 2001. Grazing, rewood and the depletion of the natural vegetation cover The natural vegetation cover has been extensively modied by human activities, especially in and around the settlement areas. It has been used for grazing and rewood, and also replaced by crops and nonnative species like poplars and eucalyptus planted along the irrigation ditches, a very distinctive feature of irrigated landscapes in Argentina. It has been also degraded in and around the settlement, irrigation, and grazing areas (Davire de Musri & Malberti de Lopez Aragon, 1999; Daz & Luna, 1991; Pannocchia, 1979). As at the end of the 1970s, the consequences of grazing were apparent in the margins of the irrigation districts, on the piedmonts, and in the neighbouring mountains (Pannocchia, 1979:86). In 2001, signs of increasing deterioration of the vegetation cover were visible in the slopes of the mountains surrounding the irrigation district of Jachal, one of the traditional grazing areas. This decline could be connected to the reports of progressively more violent run-offs and ooding during summer storms. The use of rewood for heating and for cooking in low-income rural and urban sectors is one of the activities leading to deforestation of native forests in arid and semiarid areas in Argentina (Morello & Matteuci, 2000). In Jachal, eldwork indicated that the use of rewood for heating and boilers in the winter is the norm for all the population. This fact makes rewood gathering a protable harvest, especially for owners of elds without water rights. There was some information pointing to the use of rewood in mining and railroads as other sources of deforestation. However, the corroboration of this information is difcult due to the lack of records of past stocks for comparison. Data and methods Remotely sensed data were used to explore the characteristics and extension of change in environmental conditions in Jachals recent past12. Although not without limitations, this sequence of satellite images allows for observing evolution and change consistently over time. In developing countries, data about environmental characteristics and dynamics of arid and semiarid areas are not always readily available. In this sense, the use of remotely sensed data and techniques provides a partial solution to the lack of information for the study of populationenvironment interactions, complementing ground data collection, offering different scales of spatial coverage, and enabling retrospectives studies (Jensen, 2000; Rindfuss & Stern, 1998) The study used cross-sectional remotely sensed data for 1973, 1987 and 2001, specically three LANDSAT summer (January13) images (MSS and TM). The overlap of the area included in the processed images and the area of the department of Jachal is displayed in Fig. 4. In order to have a compatible set of imagery, the preprocessing included re-projection, image-to-image rectication, and re-sampling. Processing included a Tasseled Cap Transformation (TCT) (Crist & Cicone, 1984; Jensen, 1996, 2000; Kauth & Thomas, 1976; Tso & Mather, 2001) of the three images to obtain
A more detailed account of the preprocessing and processing procedures of the remotely sensed data, including a discussion about the merits of using vegetation indices as indicators of desertication and the justication of the use of the Tasseled cap transformation, can be found in Adamo (2003). 13 In the Southern Hemisphere, summer lasts from December to March.
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Fig. 4. The study area. The gure shows the overlap of the area of the remote sensing images and the department of Jachal. Although the area of the LANDSAT images does not perfectly match the area of Jachal, it does include the areas of interest for this exploratory paper, allowing for comparing areas of irrigated agriculture, and of natural and modied vegetation cover over time. Source: Authors elaboration after Lizana (2001).

greenness indices for 1973, 1987 and 2001. Unsupervised classication of the resulting images yielded ve nal classes for 1973 and 2001. Two classes correspond to vegetated areas: BV, brigh vegetation, includes the more actively photosynthesizing vegetation, while OV, other vegetation, covers less bright vegetation. Two other classes include soil features: BS, bare soils, and BBS, bright bare soils, these last likely dryer, with lighter parent materials, or less spotted with sparse vegetation. The last one, R, is the residual class (mostly rock and shadow)14. Ancillary dataaerial photographs, topographic maps, photographs and other documentation were used in the attribution of categories, and in the analysis and interpretation of the results. In order to detect changes over time, two procedures were performed. The rst was image algebra change detection through image differentiation of the greenness indices (Jensen, 1996). Differences between images were recoded into ve categories, according to the percent increase
Accuracy assessments for the unsupervised classications could not be performed due to the timing of ground data acquisition and a temporal mismatch between the ancillary sources and the dates of image acquisition. However, ancillary data were used as the general reference for the attribution of the classes, coupled with the rst authors eldbased knowledge of the area.
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or decrease in brightness values: increase (between 100 and 21% higher), some increase (between 1 and 20% higher), unchanged, some decrease (between 1 and 20% lower) and decrease (between 21 and 100% lower). The second procedure was a post-classication comparison change detection used to obtain from-to class information (Jensen, 1996) between 1973 and 2001, resulting in a change image map with 25 classes, one for each pairwise combination of classes. The 25 classes or categories of the change detection matrix were recoded to nine dominant change categories based upon the vegetation categories (BV bright vegetation and OV other vegetation). All the aforementioned procedures were run in ERDAS Imagine for Windows. Pattern metric analysis was used to asses the conguration of the two image maps for 1973 and 2001, and deduce how the spatial arrangement of the landscape had changed over time to complement the other landscape characterization methodologies15. The source data (here, Landsat MSS and Landsat TM) are important for careful interpretation of these metrics, since the scale of acquisition in part impacts the patterns that are observed and quantied in order to infer process (Forman, 1995; ONeill et al., 1996; Walsh et al., 2001)16. Metrics for this analysis were run using the freeware Fragstats (raster data version) (McGarigal & Marks, 1995). Classied images were exported from ERDAS Imagine as unsigned 16-bit generic binary les, and run in Fragstats version 3.3 for PC environment17. Environmental change between 1973 and 2001 Greenness indices We turn now to the results of the analysis of remotely sensed data to investigate the reported trends, including deforestation and crop decline. The histograms of the greenness index derived from the Tasseled Cap transformation for 1973, 1987 and 2001, displayed in Fig. 5, show a rst indication of change over time. The distribution curves for 1973 and 2001 are very similar, while the 1987 histogram showed both a lower peak and a displacement toward higher brightness values. In the greenness index, brightness values are higher where the biomass or total amount of vegetation is higher or when the growing season (or more accurately, photosynthesis) is at its peak. The histograms suggest an overall increase in the amount of vegetation from 1973 to 1987 (in January 1973, Jachals ecosystem was just starting to recover from a long drought that started around 1965) followed by an overall decrease between 1987 and 2001. But despite the similarities, the histograms for 1973 and 2001 are not identical. While the range for 1973 goes from 55 to 235 with a mean of 94.7, the range for 2001 is displaced toward lower brightness values, 46199, with a mean of 92.6. This would indicate a small net decrease in vegetation amount in 2001 relative to 1973.
Landscape ecology posits that landscape conguration (spatial arrangement) is as important as landscape composition (thematic class representation) (Crews-Meyer, 2004). By changing the relative conguration of landscape elements, so too is the ow of energy and materials on the landscape altered (Forman & Godron, 1986). Landscape metrics are commonly now calculated from thematic data derived from satellite imagery (Jensen, 2000). 16 Scale in this case refers to both grain and extent (Turner, Gardner & ONeill, 2001), and applied to both spatial scale (extent of study area and resolution of satellite imagery) and temporal scale (range of study period and timing or seasonality of observation). 17 Software and documentation are available online at http://www.umass.edu/landeco/research/fragstats/fragstats.html.
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900000 800000 700000 600000 500000 400000 300000 200000 100000 0 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150 160 170 180 190 200 210 220 230 240 250 brightness values 1973 1987 2001
Fig. 5. Greenness index histogramsJanuary of 1973, 1987 and 2001. Source: Tasseled cap transformation of the 1973, 1987 and 2001 images.

The image differentiation results presented inTable 2 qualied the type of change observed in Fig. 5 into ve categories. All increases and decreases refer to productive green (non-woody) biomass as measured by brightness values in the greenness indices. As can be seen, the category some increase dominated the 19731987 period, while the category some decrease included more than 90% of the pixels in the 19871901 period. This trend is coincident with what the histograms in Fig. 5 showed. The numbers for the period 19732001 indicate that 56% of the pixels underwent some decrease in the brightness values, with approximately 37% having

Table 2 Greenness index image differentiation results (percent of total number of pixels, NZ16,744,000) Change category Decreased (20% and more) Some decrease (119%) Unchanged Some increase (119%) Increased (20% and more) Total 19731987 0.2 2.4 0.5 94.3 2.7 100.0 19872001 4.5 93.7 0.1 1.1 0.1 100.0 19732001 0.5 56.1 6.0 37.1 0.3 100.0

Source: Tasseled cap transformation of the 1973, 1987 and 2001 images.

counts

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experienced some increase. Again, this suggests that there was a small net decrease in biomass in the study area between 1973 and 2001, and that this decrease has not been linear but uctuating. Visual inspection of the maps displaying the greenness index image differentiation results gives an idea of the spatial distribution of the areas of change. Fig. 6 displays the areas that changed between 1973 and 2001, following the categories of Table 2. The image is dominated by areas in the moderate categories (some decrease and some increase), which are located mostly outside of the irrigation districts, and in segments of the study area with natural vegetation cover. Areas of some increase cover the mountains on the west and southwest of

Fig. 6. Greenness index image differentiation map, 19732001. Source: Image differentiation of the greenness indexes from the TCT, 1973 and 2001 images.

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the study area, as well as part of the sierras on the east. Areas of some decrease appear concentrated in the Travesa on the east, and in the mountains in north of the study area. Small patches of increase (20% and more) are located in the irrigation districts as well as in the Travesa on the east. The areas where vegetation decreased 20% or more are mostly concentrated in the main irrigation districts, especially in Jachal, Tucunuco, and Huaco. There is also a small concentration in the north mountains, where most of the puestos are located, and on the east. These results indicate that the sections of the study area where changes between 1973

Fig. 7. Greenness index image differentiation map, 19731987. Source: Image differentiation of the greenness indexes from the TCT, 1973 and 1987 images.

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and 2001 were more dramatic tend to coincide largely with the areas of settlement, agriculture and grazing. Figs. 7 and 8 present a rst approximation to the timing of the changes. For the period 1973 1987, displayed in Fig. 7, the areas of some biomass increase dominate the image outside of the irrigation districts. The areas of 20% or more increase are located in the irrigated districts, as well as in the natural grazing areas in the mountains on the west and north, and in areas of the Travesa far east. In the irrigated districts, the areas of increase are intertwined with other categories. The areas of some decrease are found along the Travesa and in the irrigation

Fig. 8. Greenness index image differentiation map, 19872001. Source: Image differentiation of the greenness indexes from the TCT, 1987 and 2001 images.

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Table 3 Distribution of the department area by class, 1973 and 2001 Classes 1973 Area (Has) 1. Residual (rock and shadow) R 2. Bare soils BS 3. Bright bare soils (salt, sand, etc.) BBS 4. Bright vegetation BV 5. Other vegetation OV 474,251.9 604,659.2 168,973.4 19,583.3 242,413.1 % 31.4 40.0 11.2 1.3 16.0 2001 Area (Has) 609,076.9 555,075.4 186,195.7 3721.4 155,811.4 % 40.3 36.8 12.3 0.2 10.3

Source: Unsupervised classication of the 1973 and 2001 images.

districts, and to a lesser extent in the north mountains, although these sites are difcult to display at this scale. Places showing a 20% or higher decrease in biomass are overwhelmingly concentrated in the irrigated sections. Also, areas of decrease match the location of the puestos in northern mountains of Jachal. The map for the period 19872001, displayed in Fig. 8, shows a complete dominance of the areas of some biomass decrease (119%), a reverse trend from the dominance of some increase in 19731987. Spots of vegetation decrease have multiplied, and some large sections are visible in the southeast corner of the study area. While these areas and the spots in the western mountains are new, the proliferation of areas of decrease in the irrigation districts and in the puestos region appear as a continuation and intensication of the 19731987 trends. The patches of vegetation increase (20% or more), visible in some of the irrigation districtsJachal, Niquivil and Huacoand in the eastern Travesa, look very small in comparison. Classication and change detection The unsupervised classication of the study area for 1973 and 2001 is shown in Table 3. In 1973, the most frequently observed landscape class was bare soil, which occupied 40.0% or just over 600,000 ha of the study area. Brighter bare soils covered 11.2% of the landscape. Nearly one-third of the area was classied as rock/shadow (R), with the remaining 17.4% classied as vegetation (1.3% bright vegetation and 16.1% other vegetation). In 2001, the most commonly occurring class was rock and shadow, which covered 40.3% of the landscape. The second most common class was bare soil, which covered 36.8% of the landscape or over 555,000 ha. Just over 12% of the landscape was classied as bare bright soil, with a total of 10.5% of the landscape determined to be vegetation (0.2% or 3721 ha BV and 10.3% or 155,811 ha OV). Although there are some differences in the distribution of the classes between 1973 and 2001, in both years bright vegetation represents the smallest proportion, consistent with the small proportion of Jachal that is best suited for agriculture, the sparse of the natural vegetation cover, and the abundance of patches of bare soil. There was a decrease in the two vegetation categories, from 17.3% of the total area in 1973 to 10.5% in 2001, which agrees with the results in Table 2 and Figs. 68. Table 4 shows the change detection matrices 19732001 in both percentages of pixels and area.18 The numbers in the diagonals indicate the percentage of pixels and their corresponding
18 A pixel is a two-dimensional picture element that is the smallest non-divisible element of a digital image (Jensen, 1996:17). In this analysis, pixel dimensions are 30!30 m.

S. B. Adamo, K. A. Crews-Meyer / Applied Geography 26 (2006) 6185 Table 4 Change detection matrices: 19732001 Percentages (%) Classes 1973 1. Residual (rock and shadow) R 2. Bare soils BS 3. Bright bare soils (salt, sand, etc.) BBS 4. Bright vegetation BV 5. Other vegetation OV Area (Hectares) Classes 1973 1. Residual (rock and shadow) R 2. Bare soils BS 3. Bright bare soils (salt, sand, etc.) BBS 4. Bright vegetation BV 5. Other vegetation OV Total 2001 2001 1. R 369,464.3 97,053.2 6,279.1 3,097.5 133,182.7 609,076.9 2. BS 51,986.7 401,059.3 75,182.4 2,380.8 24,466.2 555,075.4 3. BBS 7,261.7 84,493.1 80,690.9 798.3 12,951.6 186,195.7 4. BV 5. OV 26.5 45,512.5 574.1 21,479.5 277.9 6,543.0 2,452.3 10,854.4 390.5 71,422.0 3,731.4 155,811.4 2001 1. R 77.9 16.05 3.72 15.82 54.94 2. BS 10.96 66.33 44.49 12.16 10.09 3. BBS 1.53 13.97 47.75 4.08 5.34 4. BV 0.01 0.09 0.16 12.52 0.16 5. OV 9.60 3.55 3.87 55.43 29.46

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Total 1973 474,251.9 604,659.2 168,973.4 19,583.3 242,413.1 1,509,880.9

Source: Change detection of the unsupervised classication of the 1973 and 2001 images.

area that remained in the same class from 1973 to 2001. For example, 77.9% of the pixels included in R (residual) in 1973 were in that same category in 2001, while the rest (22.1%) appeared distributed in the rest of the classes, indicating the changes between 1973 and 2001. Looking rst at the vegetation categories (BV and OV), over 50% of the area included in BV, bright vegetation in 1973 was classied as other vegetation in 2001, 13% remained in the same class, and the rest (32% or 6,200 ha) passed to non-vegetation categories. Regarding OV, other vegetation, 74% of the area (170,600 ha) changed to the residual category, and 30% remained in the same. In the case of the BBS, bright bare soils (includes the saline areas), just under 50% remained in the same category, and 4% (representing 6,800 ha) changed to vegetated classes. Most of the area in the class BS, bare soils in 1973 remained in the same category, but 3.5% or 22,000 ha changed to OV or BV between 1973 and 2001. Finally, most of the residual category (78%) remained the same, but about 10% (45,500 ha) changed to other vegetation. In summary, in 2001 vegetation classes seems to have lost about 102,000 ha or 39% of the area they covered in 1973, despite the small gain in vegetation from 1973 to 1987 shown by the greenness indices. Fig. 9 displays the spatial distribution of the combined 25 from-to categories of the change detection matrix recoded to nine change classes. This extraction was framed around the vegetation categories BV (bright vegetation) and OV (other vegetation). Newly vegetated areas correspond to places that changed from non-vegetation categories (rock, bares soils, bright bare soils) to vegetation categories (bright or other vegetation). Areas where loss of vegetation may be presumed are those that changed from vegetation categories to nonvegetation categories. Two clear sectors are visible in the image: those where changes related to vegetation or biomass took place and those where they did not. Areas where changes related to vegetation took

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Fig. 9. Change detection map, 19732001. Source: Change detection matrix, 19732001.

place correspond mostly to the irrigation districts, population centres and grazing areas. Places where changes were not related to vegetation (in grey in the map) follow the trace of the higher parts of the mountains and sierras, and most of the Travesa area. Grey areas within the irrigation districts represent spots without vegetation in 1973 and in 2001. The sections that lost vegetation (in brown and yellow in the map) are concentrated in the north, west and southwest of the Jachal district, where most of the population lives close or nearby the grazing zones. There are also visible patches in other irrigated areas, notably between

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Jachal and Tucunuco. However, a part of the grazing and puestos areassurrounding Jachal by the north, on the west of Niquivil-Tucunuco and in the north of the study areaseem to have remained in the same vegetation class between 1973 and 2001. Other areas where vegetation categories do not change are scattered in the irrigation districts, notably Niquivil. The small areas that kept their dense bright vegetation (in red in the map) are hardly visible in the north and south of the Jachal district, where patches showing relative biomass gains (OVBV, in light blue in the map) and losses (BVOV, in blue) are also found. Areas that gained vegetation (in light and dark green) appear concentrated in the irrigation districts (except Niquivil), and in areas surrounding the puestos on the southwest of the study area. Some small patches are located in the Travesa, following the water courses. Landscape metrics and change over time Table 5 displays the results of the landscape metrics. In 1973, the patch density of the classes suggests that Bright Vegetation (BV) was not only sparsely represented on the 1973 landscape, but that the size of the patches was very small and dispersed compared with other classes (the 1872 patches of BV were sized and distributed such that the patch porosity was a low 0.12 patches/100 ha). In contrast, the other vegetation (OV) was not only more spatially extensive, but was distributed in larger patches, with its 25,242 patches averaging 1.67 patches/100 ha. In addition, BV appeared to be relatively regularly shaped with less edge and simpler geometry than OV, as the more fragmented OV showed higher edge density akin to bare soil and rock/ shadow. Bright bare soil in particular had an extremely low edge density compared to most other
Table 5 Class metrics, 1973 and 2001 Class Class metrics, 1973 Bright vegetation Other vegetation Bare soil Bright bare soil Rock and shadow Class metrics, 1973 Bright vegetation Other vegetation Bare soil Bright bare soil Rock and shadow CA 19,583 242,413 604,659 168,973 474,252 3,721 155,811 555,075 186,195 609,077 Pland 1.3 16.1 40.0 11.2 31.4 0.2 10.3 36.8 12.3 40.3 NP 1872 25,242 15,017 10,012 13,034 2037 76,319 71,495 58,743 61,488 PD 0.12 1.67 0.99 0.66 0.86 0.13 5.05 4.74 3.89 4.07 ED 1.83 23.23 27.78 11.73 21.79 0.85 37.33 55.27 28.56 64.62 LSI 49.31 178.35 135.55 107.93 120.08 52.32 357.22 280.63 250.14 313.20 IJI 66.85 58.61 84.47 6.46 47.12 9.06 40.53 67.68 41.56 67.75

Landscape metrics, 1973 and 2001 Year 1973 2001 TA 1,509,881 1,509,881 NP 65,177 270,082 PD 4.32 17.89 ED 43.18 93.31 LSI 133.65 287.65 IJI 65.88 63.94

Class, thematic landscape class; CA, class area, hectares; Pland, percent landscape; NP, number patches; PD, patch density (patches/100 ha); ED, edge density (m/100 ha); LSI, landscape shape index; IJI, interspersion juxtaposition P P P index; Year, year of classication; TA, total area; note: IJIZ fK m eik = m eik lneik = m eik g=lnmK1 where kZ1 kZ1 kZ1 eik, total length (m) of edge in landscape between patch types (classes) i and k,mZnumber of patch types (classes) present e in the landscape, including the landscape border, if present. LSIZ mini ei where ei, total length of edge (or perimeter) of class i in terms of cell surfaces, includes all landscape boundary and background edge segments involving class i. min ei, minimum total length of edge (or perimeter) of class i in terms of number of cell surfaces.

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classes, and the second lowest Landscape Shape Index (LSI) after BV. However, Bright Bare Soil was dramatically less interspersed with other classes (as per the very low Interspersion/ Juxtaposition index) whereas Bare Soil was the most interspersed class, with an IJI of 84.47. Taken together, these results suggest that the more photosynthetically productive vegetation (BV) was, while less frequently observed, interspersed with other classes but was relatively unfragmented with more regularly (smoothly) shaped borders: together these factors indicate the presence of human management, such as irrigation or fertilization. OV, in contrast, existed in larger and more frequently occurring patches that were slightly less interspersed with other classes, and with more irregularly shaped geometries, suggesting more natural vegetation (less anthropogenic inuence). In 2001, patch densities of each class were fairly even with the exception of the very low patch density (0.13 patches/100 ha) of BV. OV densities were the highest at 5.05 patches/100 ha. The edge densities of rock/shadow and bare soil were relatively high (64.2 and 55.27 m/ha), as were their LSI and IJI scores; together these results indicate that these classes had relatively complex geometries, were more interspersed, and had more edge (compared to interior) than the other landscape classes. The vegetation classes did not behave homogenously; the edge density for BV was quite low (0.85 m/ha) whereas the edge density for OV was much higher at 37.33. Because edge density is normalized by patch area, these differences cannot be attributed to the more numerous and larger patches of OV compared to BV. Further, OV exhibited moderately high LSI and IJI scores, indicating the class was less smoothly shaped with greater edge and greater interspersion among other classes than BV, which had extremely low LSI and IJI scores. It is improper to compare metrics from different images head to head, since many factors can change between two images (Forman, 1995)19. However, general trends in relative dispersion and arrangement of the classes can be gleaned as having changed over time. First, the shift in spatially dominant classes support ndings of a change in climate (temperature and/or precipitation), land management, or both. The increase in the brightest soils suggest that, given that the soil types did not change drastically throughout the image over that time period, the soils were dryer and/or had less scattered vegetation or woody matter interspersed (but too ne to be picked up by satellite). More interesting, however, is the shift in the vegetation classes. While OV was more frequently observed than BV in both images, their congurations seem to have changed dramatically in the intervening years. For example, BV decreased in area (15,861.6 ha, or 81.0% of its 1973 expanse), yet increased in number of patches with lower edge density and IJI. These results together suggest a class which is becoming not only less frequent but also more fragmented and isolated on the landscape while also becoming less irregularly shaped. OV, somewhat similarly, appears to be a landscape class also under threat of increasing fragmentation. It also lost a great deal of area while seeing an increase in the number of patches. At the same time, its edge density decreased, its LSI increased, and its IJI dropped somewhat. Overall, these results suggest that the less photosynthetically productive vegetation of the OV class is not only shrinking but becoming more isolated from the other landscape classes, though the patches are becoming somewhat more complex (and more fragmented) in shape. These changes could be attributed to seasonal or longer term climatic shifts (for example, that the 2001 image was acquired in a dryer season or year) or to changes in land management
Although the same number of classes was used in 1973 and 2001, the source data were very different. The 1973 image was classied from a Landsat MSS scene which had only four spectral bands and nominal 79 m resolution before resampling. The 2001 Landsat TM image yielded seven spectral bands used in this analysis that were acquired at nominal 30 m resolution (and with better signal to noise ratios, or SNR).
19

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(e.g. converting BV to OV, due to water shortages, purposive land conversion, or natural succession to older, less productive vegetation). The latter is strongly supported by the change analysis. Considering the above ndings in light of the landscape metrics provides additional insight into the changing composition and conguration of these landscape elements. In 1973, there were just over 65,000 patches on the landscape; by 2001, this number had increased more than fourfold to over 270,000 patches. Obviously the landscape became patchier, with patch density or porosity also increasing fourfold. Edge density doubled between 1973 and 2001, as did LSI (a measure of shape complexity). Interestingly, however, IJI remained relatively constant over the period, suggesting that while the landscape was becoming more fragmented, the classes themselves were on average not becoming more interspersed, meaning that the fragmentation resulted in a new landscape conguration in terms of shape but not, on average, in terms of thematic composition (though some individual classes did show changes in IJI, these were less spatially prevalent and thus did not impact the landscape metrics as much).

Discussion The results from the analyses of the remote sensing data indicate several changes between 1973 and 2001. While it is certainly plausible to suggest that these changes might be artifacts of the classications or differing data sources, the magnitude of the changes and the consistency among the different landscapes metrics evaluated here instead point to a landscape that is undergoing a reorganization that, as with many arid landscapes, is substantial but subtle. The results show cycles of vegetation decline and regeneration that are likely associated with the variations in moisture availability in the department. Differences between 1973 and 1987 are probably linked, at least partly, to the recovery from the drought that struck the department in the second half of the 1960s. These uctuations were found mostly outside the settlement areas (irrigated districts and grazing zones). There is also evidence of a net decline in biomass between 1973 and 2001, despite the recuperation in the period 19872001, and a slight increase of areas of bright and bare soils (the BBS and BS classes). This may be a rst indication of land degradation leading to desertication, since in this area bright bare soils are typically indicative of salty land unsuitable for agriculture. The pattern of the changes appears to be different in the irrigation districts, grazing areas and surrounding zones, as shown by the greenness and change detection maps. The several areas where change in the greenness index was classied as 20% or more were consistently located in and around irrigated places. Also, the irrigation districts and to a lesser extent the grazing areas displayed a very fragmented or patched pattern in the distribution of the type of changes. These may be indicating not only more changes but also increasingly aggressive ones. Overall, the review of the environmental framework and the forms of management taken with the results of the analysis of remotely sensed data indicate that both aridity and desertication are behind environmental change in Jachal. The relative inuence of human and natural factors in land degradation in the department are intertwined, and the environmental constraints have interacted with the forms of use and management of natural resources for a long time, reinforcing each other. For example, while the irrigation system buffers some of the effects of aridity, the particular irrigation system at work (gravity) contributes to land degradation by increasing salinization. In turn, the typical limitations of

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gravity irrigation systems are exacerbated by the salty quality of the waters of the Jachal river. A basic interpretation is that the modications in the irrigated and populated areas are more likely due to social processes, while changes in the rest of the department are a response to natural processes. Increases in salty areas could have been promoted by a particularly dry summer if located in the eastern Travesa, but if this change were found in the irrigated districts it would very likely be due to inadequate irrigation practices. Changes in land use are likely behind some of the changes detected between 1973 and 2001. Tax incentives for crop diversication, implemented during the 1990s, substantially increased the amount of land in olive orchards in the Jachal and Huaco irrigation districts. Olive trees require between 5 and 8 years to grow, and in between the soil looks bare because of the very low coverage of the young trees. Bare soils are more exposed to wind and water erosion. Another relevant social process is population redistribution. The 1991 and 2001 Argentinas censuses of population indicated a sustained decline of population in the south west section of the study area. This decrease could be an indication of the abandonment of puestos in this grazing sector, one of the areas where an increase in vegetation was detected. Conversely, the signs of vegetation decline around the district of Jachal (notably on the north and east) may be the result of overgrazing, rewood gathering, and a relatively recent expansion of the cultivated area. Population settlement has increased in this section of the district, which is relatively more sensitive to land degradation because of the slopes. Finally, the small patches of vegetation decrease in the northern mountains coincide with the location of Gualcamayo, one of the oldest mountain settlements of Jachal. It is important to remember that the images, each representing a xed point in time, may be registering just a stage of an ongoing process. It was observed during eldwork in Mogna that vegetation cover in areas under waterlogging (raising of the water table) and salinization went through different phases before being killed by the salt. In one of those phases, vegetation appears dense and green, but the only species left at this point are halophytes (jumes and zampas are their local name) not suitable to be used as forage. This aspect is relevant for the interpretation of remotely sensed data, since green vegetation may sometimes be indeed an indication of land degradation. In these cases, it is necessary to pay greater attention to location, patterns and shapes, and ground verication ancillary data. Conclusions This exploratory analysis suggests a complex panorama with respect to environmental hazards in Jachal, as well as their evolution and nature. Overall, aridity is simultaneously the typical characteristic, the primary environmental constraint and the main hazard of the department of Jachal. Aridity means that water shortages in general as well as seasonal and inter-annual variations in water availability are the norm. Climatic events such as droughts, oods, and hailstorms add to the hazard posed by the characteristics of the arid climate. The drainage is limited, with multitude of occasional and temporary courses and just two permanent rivers, the Jachal and the Huaco, which have structured population settlement. Soil quality is not optimal and natural vegetation cover is low, although extremely modied in the irrigated areas. However, aridity is not the only process at work in this landscape, and its effects are complicated by both natural resources management issues and other social issues related

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to agriculture and settlement in arid lands. In Jachal, the main natural resources are water, land, and to a lesser extent the natural vegetation cover, and irrigated farming and ranching have profoundly modied the natural landscape. Seemingly, the local and historical forms of management of this arid environment have led to a number of environmental problems, among them salinization, waterlogging, deforestation, and soil infestation. But the incidence and signicance of the problems presents marked spatial and temporal variations. The physical and biological environment may be regarded as part of the context that shape social phenomena (Rindfuss & Stern, 1998:3). In this sense, environmental change and degradation present a critical issue in arid and semiarid agricultural areas because they affect, in different ways, the economic basis of the livelihood strategies of the population by changing the circumstances under which decisions are made. The long-term population-environment relationship in Jachal suggests that the population has adapted to the type of hazards represented by the natural constraints and the environmental problems associated with the management of natural resources. The question remains if they can continue to adapt should these processes continue a linear rather than cyclical evolution. Although the evidence presented in this paper does not indicate a generalized process of desertication in the study area, it does allow for the conclusion that land degradation should be included among the environmental hazards in Jachal. Even if a rampant desertication process is not yet apparent, it is likely that vegetation loss in the irrigation districts, grazing areas, and areas of rewood gathering are pointing to incipient and currently localized processes of land degradation that could eventually trigger desertication if they overcome the resilience of this agro-ecological system. Acknowledgements While preparing this paper, S. Adamo was supported by a fellowship from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Urbanization and Migration Center Grant at the Carolina Population Center. The original research was supported by The Population Council, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Center for the Study of Urbanization and Internal Migration in Developing Countries of the Population Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

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