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A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Human Impacts on the Rainforest Environment in Ecuador

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Human Population

Part of the book series: Ecological Studies ((ECOLSTUD,volume 214))

Abstract

Renowned for biological diversity, Amazonian rainforests are also regions of high cultural diversity. However, in recent decades, most indigenous rainforest people have become settled and acquired titles to large tropical forest areas, are increasingly integrating into the market economy, and are experiencing rapid sociocultural change. In this chapter, we examine five ethnic groups in the northern Ecuadorian Amazon and highlight the importance of sociocultural and economic contexts in understanding indigenous patterns of forest use. Using ethnographic and survey data collected in 2001, we compare and contrast these indigenous populations in terms of demographic characteristics, involvement in the market economy, and patterns of forest conversion and faunal exploitation, observing different degrees of external pressures and opportunities, cultural values, and historical constraints, which, taken together, influence their choices about resource use and market contact and their long-run prospects for cultural survival.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In some communities, several households far from the community center were excluded from the time use study and the household diaries as they could not be routinely visited in the circuit of random visits.

  2. 2.

    When necessary, an interpreter was recruited from the community to assist. This was necessary only about 10% of the time, mainly with older women in Cofán and Huaorani communities.

  3. 3.

    TFR is the number of live births that a woman would be expected to have during her lifetime based on current fertility levels, viz. age-specific fertility rates of women aged 15–19, 20–24, …, to 45–49. The TFR is the sum of the age-specific fertility rates for the seven age groups of women, each of which is based on the sum of births in a year to females of that age group divided by the number of women of that age group. It is a widely used indicator of period fertility.

  4. 4.

    These numbers are actually based on preliminary tabulations from the second or survey phase of the project, based on replies from 289–298 wives of heads of households in 28 communities. The 53% figure is still much lower than the figure for colonist women (70%) – see Bilsborrow et al. (2004).

  5. 5.

    Data from the household surveys of rural colonist populations in 1999 and of indigenous populations in 2001 indicate a striking increase in immunization of children of both indigenous and colonist children in the Ecuadorian Amazon between the 1980s and 1990s (Pan and Erlien 2004).

  6. 6.

    However, at the time of the study, tourism levels had dramatically declined, which is likely to have elevated rates of hunting from their usual level.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful for funding from the National Institutes of Health (RO1-HD38777); for comments on a previous draft from the editors and anonymous reviewers; for the collaboration of our two subcontractors, Fundación Ecociencia and Centro de Estudios sobre Población y Desarrollo Social (both in Quito, Ecuador); and to the Spatial Analysis Unit of the Carolina Population Center, particularly Brian Frizzelle. Finally, we thank our principal Ecuadorian colleagues, Ana Oña and Francis Baquero, for assistance in fieldwork; our colleague, Bruce Winterhalder for suggestions in the design phase of the ethnographic project; Jason Bremner and Clark Gray for data cleaning and analysis; all the ethnographers who carried out the intensive fieldwork; and the residents of the 36 indigenous study villages for their collaboration.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Latin American and Latino Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, 95064, USA

    Flora Lu

  2. Department of Biostatistics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599, USA

    Richard E. Bilsborrow

Authors
  1. Flora Lu
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  2. Richard E. Bilsborrow
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Correspondence to Flora Lu .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Demographer-in-residence, The Stimson Center, 19th St. NW. 1111, Washington, 20036, District of Columbia, USA

    Richard P. Cincotta

  2. , Department of Landscape Architecture, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16802-1912, Pennsylvania, USA

    Larry J. Gorenflo

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Lu, F., Bilsborrow, R.E. (2011). A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Human Impacts on the Rainforest Environment in Ecuador. In: Cincotta, R., Gorenflo, L. (eds) Human Population. Ecological Studies, vol 214. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-16707-2_8

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