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Forest cover change trajectories and their impact on landslide occurrence in the tropical Andes

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Abstract

Tropical mountain regions are prone to landslide hazards. Given the current land pressure with increasing occupation of steep uplands, landslide hazards are expected to increase in the near future. Understanding the factors that control landslide hazards is therefore essential. Rare event logistic regression allows us to perform a robust detection of landslide controlling factors. This technique is here applied to the tropical Andes to evaluate the impact of dynamic land cover changes on landslide occurrences. Land cover change trajectories (i.e. dynamic evolution of land cover through time) were specifically included in the probabilistic landslide analysis. While natural physical processes such as slope undercutting by rivers and failure of oversteepened slopes are important in this tropical mountainous site, landslides are increasingly associated with human activities. The data show that land cover trajectories are associated with landslide patterns. In this humid mountainous site, forest degradation does not lead to a measurable increase in landslide occurrence. However, few years after forests are converted to pastures, a rapid decline of slope stability is observed. Land cover conversion from forest to pasture permanently reduces slope stability. It is assumed that major changes in soil properties and hydrology induced by the vegetation conversion play a role in accelerating landslide hazards.

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Acknowledgments

Data collection and logistic support for this project was provided through the Belgian Science Policy grant SR/00/133 FOMO and the CUD-PIC project ‘Strengthening the scientific and technological capacities to implement spatially integrated land and water management schemes adapted to local socio-economic and physical settings’. M. Guns was funded through a Ph.D. fellowship from the Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique (FRS-FNRS, Belgium), and the Fund for Tropical Geography Yola Verhasselt of the Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences (Belgium). The authors would like to thank Pr. D. Alvarado and Ing. P. Borja (Universidad de Cuenca, Ecuador), the engineers of CGPaute (Ecuador), Ing. L. Jerves (Celec, Hidropaute, Ecuador) and Dr. A. Molina (KULeuven, Belgium) for their precious help on the field.

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  1. Georges Lemaître Centre for Earth and Climate Research, Earth and Life Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Place Louis Pasteur 3 boîte L4.03.08, 1348, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

    Marie Guns & Veerle Vanacker

  2. Fund for Scientific Research, FNRS, Rue d’Egmont 5, 1000, Brussels, Belgium

    Marie Guns

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  1. Marie Guns
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  2. Veerle Vanacker
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Correspondence to Marie Guns.

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Guns, M., Vanacker, V. Forest cover change trajectories and their impact on landslide occurrence in the tropical Andes. Environ Earth Sci 70, 2941–2952 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-013-2352-9

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