Gustavo M. Cruz-Bello

Environmental conflicts and nature reserves: redesigning Sierra San Pedro Mártir National Park, Mexico

Nature reserves can be considered a land-use category that competes with other land-uses for territory. Therefore, one fundamental goal in conservation planning is to arrive at nature reserve designs that protect the most valuable lands for conservation, and avoid the inclusion of tracts of land valuable for other stakeholders. However, the complexity of conservation issues, the urgency for protecting critical biodiversity components and the lack of data have forced planners to rely on expert knowledge and public participation for designing nature reserves. Handling expert and public knowledge is challenging because it can be subjective, biased, value laden, context specific, and ambiguous. Here, we present a land suitability assessment (LSA) approach for designing the Sierra San Pedro Martir National Park, Baja California, Mexico. The LSA allowed us the optimal configuration SSPM in terms of delimitation (inclusion of the most valuable biological resources) and zoning (segregation of incompatible land-uses).

Livelihoods and landscapes at the threshold of change: disaster and resilience in a Chiapas coffee community

In 2005, torrential rains associated with Hurricane Stan devastated farm systems in southern Mexico. We present a case study on the impacts of and responses to Hurricane Stan by coffee households in three communities in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico, with the objective of illuminating the linkages between household vulnerability and resilience. We analyze data from 64 household surveys in a cluster analysis to link household impacts experienced to post-Stan adaptive responses and relate these results with landscape-level land-cover changes. The degree of livelihood change was most significant for land-constrained households whose specialization in coffee led to high exposure and sensitivity to Stan and little adaptive capacity. Across the sample, the role of coffee in livelihood strategies declined, as households sought land to secure subsistence needs and diversified economically after Stan. Nevertheless, livelihoods and landscape outcomes were not closely coupled, at least at the temporal and spatial scale of our analysis: We found no evidence of land-use change associated with farmers’ coping strategies. While households held strong attitudes regarding effective resource management for risk reduction, this knowledge does not necessarily translate into capacities to manage resilience at broader scales. We argue that policy interventions are needed to help materialize local strategies and knowledge on risk management, not only to allow individual survival but also to enhance resilience at local, community and landscape scales.

Connotative land degradation mapping: A knowledge-based approach to land degradation assessment

Land degradation mapping is a problem-solving task that aims to provide information for allocating budgets and materials to counter the deterioration of land resources. Typically, it entails the implementation of a set of indicators in a GIS to appraise the severity of land degradation across a territory. Nevertheless, the selection of these indicators has proved to be challenging in practice and often this selection reflects one particular and thus limited perspective of land degradation. Because land degradation is intrinsically complex and involves decisions by many agencies and individuals, land degradation mapping should be used as a learning tool through which managers, experts and stakeholders can re-examine their views within a wider semantic context. In this paper, we introduce an analytical framework, called Connotative Land Degradation Mapping, which aims to depict the meaning of a multiplicity of interacting drivers and effects The CLDM entails the implementation of (1) geographic information systems and multicriteria decision analysis (GIS-MCDA), and (2) geo-visualization. The approach is illustrated through a case study of two urban watersheds in central Mexico. Results showed that the main land degradation drivers in the study area were related to natural processes, which were exacerbated by human activities. The output of the CLDM enabled a better communication of the land degradation issues and concerns in a way relevant for policymakers.

Regional Environmental Assessment for Multiagency Policy Making: Implementing an Environmental Ontology through GIS-MCDA

Regional environmental assessments aim to synthesize the complex dynamics of socioenvironmental systems to facilitate sustainable policymaking. Theoretically, these assessments serve as ‘boundary objects’ that link scientific knowledge and policy making within a multiagency context. Nevertheless, achieving a boundary object is challenging because of the significant technical and scientific uncertainties, as well as the contrasting perceptions, values, and ideologies regarding the environmental issues of concern. Drawing on theoretical developments concerning the meaning and interpretation of geographical entities, we introduce an analytical framework based upon the development of environmental ontologies. These ontologies are capable of depicting the complexity of socioenvironmental systems in manageable terms, so that the results are empirically valid and concretize the multidimensional meanings of geographical entities. The analytical framework is operationalized through a geographical information system — multicriteria modeling approach (GIS-MCDA). The approach is illustrated through a case study regarding the assessment of cumulative impacts in two urban watersheds in Mexico.