Productive Diversification and Sustainable Use of Complex Social-Ecological Systems: A Comparative Study of Indigenous and Settler Communities in the Bolivian Amazon

Abstract

Agricultural and forest productive diversification depends on multiple socioeconomic drivers—like knowledge, migration, productive capacity, and market—that shape productive strategies and influence their ecological impacts. Our comparison of indigenous and settlers allows a better understanding of how societies develop different diversification strategies in similar ecological contexts and how the related socioeconomic aspects of diversification are associated with land cover change. Our results suggest that although indigenous people cause less deforestation and diversify more, diversification is not a direct driver of deforestation reduction. A multidimensional approach linking sociocognitive, economic, and ecological patterns of diversification helps explain this contradiction.

Keywords:

• productive diversification
• biocultural diversity
• indigenous knowledge
• deforestation
• Bolivian Amazon

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Corrigendum

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors acknowledge financial support from the Swiss Network of International Studies and the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research North-South: Research Partnerships for Mitigating Syndromes of Global Change, co-funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, and participating institutions. The authors are also thankful for the support provided by Amanda A. Morgan for copyediting the manuscript. Finally, the anonymous referees are gratefully acknowledged for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.