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Demographic Pressure and the Sustainability of Land Use in Rwanda

Author

Listed:
  • Kangasniemi, Jaakko
  • Reardon, Thomas

Abstract

Increasing land scarcity forces Rwandan farmers to expand the area under food crops at the expense of pasture, fallow, and forest. Since the non-cropping uses of land provide more vegetative cover against erosion than most food crops, land scarcity appears to be associated with unsustainable land uses. However, demographic pressure also pushes farmers to grow crops in dense associations, which increases vegetative cover on cultivated fields. The estimated relationship between farm size and protective crop cover depends crucially on how the measure of vegetative cover is adjusted to account for high cropping densities. Without any adjustment, the association between land scarcity and erosive land use is strong; with the adjustment used here, it disappears, except for high altitude areas, where bananas, the only major food crop that protects land well against erosion, do not grow well.

Suggested Citation

  • Kangasniemi, Jaakko & Reardon, Thomas, 1997. "Demographic Pressure and the Sustainability of Land Use in Rwanda," 1997 Occasional Paper Series No. 7 198042, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:iaaeo7:198042
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.198042
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    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/198042/files/agecon-occpapers-1997-004_1_.pdf
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    Cited by:

    1. McKay, Andrew & Loveridge, Scott, 2005. "Exploring The Paradox Of Rwandan Agricultural Household Income And Nutritional Outcomes In 1990 And 2000," Staff Paper Series 11582, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.

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