Paper short abstract:

We highlight the ways in which human land use in tropical forests has changed through human history and the consequences for different aspects of the Earth system. We discuss the importance of interdisciplinary research for understanding past tropical land use and its legacies for the 21st century.

Paper long abstract:

The ‘Anthropocene’ refers to an epoch in which humans have become a dominant geological force on the planet. Land use is one of the major ways in which our species is making itself felt by the Earth system, with land cover changes having major impacts on biodiversity, soils, and climate. This paper argues that, thanks to their critical role in the function of different parts of the planetary system, exploring the impacts of land use on tropical forests through time is essential for exploring deep time pathways into the Anthropocene – from the emergence of food production to the impacts of European colonialism. Reviewing the available archaeological, historical, palaeoecological, and modelling toolkit available to researchers, we argue that better characterizing changes in tropical land use can reveal important legacies that shape our current relationship with the Earth and can help us to charter more just, sustainable routes forward into the future.

Paper short abstract:

This talk presents some of the methods currently used to study past human impacts in the Amazon forest and discusses some of the difficulties faced while trying to untangle pre- and post-colonial landscape legacies in tropical environments.

Paper long abstract:

Despite significant advances in our understanding of how indigenous land-use shaped biodiversity in the Amazon rainforest, there are several key questions that remain unanswered, particularly in relation to the consequences of European invasion upon existing biocultural landscapes. These include: how did indigenous management practices and forest composition vary between different regions of the Amazon in 1500?; to what extent did the rainforest "recover" after the ensuing demographic collapse of its indigenous populations?; is extensive slash-and-burn agriculture a post-colonial phenomenon?; and how did different post-colonial and capitalist extractivist cycles (e.g. the Rubber Boom) shape current biodiversity? This paper presents a summary of available data on this topic, highlighting the contributions of innovative approaches combining archaeological and palaeoecological datasets, and discusses some of the methodological challenges that face researchers seeking to compare pre- and post-colonial land-use in tropical environments.

Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the impact of colonialism on East African landscapes using sediment cores from Lake Baringo. The paleorecord findings contradict the notion that colonialism and European settlement exacerbated land degradation in the region.

Paper long abstract:

This paper investigates the impacts of colonial influence on East African landscapes based on evidence in the sediment cores recovered from Lake Baringo. Results from the Lake Baringo paleorecord challenge the prevailing view that colonialism and European settlement in the Lake Baringo ecosystem are the geneses of land degradation in the region. During the colonial period, the European settlers alienated the indigenous pastoralists from their dry season grazing lands by occupying, and fencing off the well-watered highlands to the south and east of Lake Baringo, confining the local pastoralists to the climatically harsh and ecologically fragile lowlands. In addition, the European settler community severed the seasonal grazing areas and watering points from the African herders, condemning them to use the fragile lowlands, which quickly degraded permanently. However, the Lake Baringo record shows no significant change in the high sedimentation rates for both the prehistoric period, before European settlement in the Baringo ecosystem, and after, including more recent times, which questions the widely held view that land degradation became synonymous with the Baringo ecosystem following European settlement and colonization.

Paper short abstract:

Despite their relevance to questions of colonial impacts and legacies, Africa’s tropical islands have been largely overlooked. To bridge this gap, we discuss human-environment relationships, past and present, in São Tomé and Príncipe, one of the most understudied biodiversity hotspots in the world.

Paper long abstract:

Integrated archaeological and paleoecological research on tropical biodiversity hotspots is crucial to understand how historical human-environment interactions affected their resilience and vulnerability, what legacies have been left behind, and how these insights can contribute to the future sustainability of these environments. Africa’s islands, however, have been largely overlooked.

To bridge this gap, our research focuses on São Tomé and Príncipe, one of the most understudied biodiversity hotspots in the world, situated in West Africa's Gulf of Guinea. Being possibly the only country where no systematic archaeological fieldwork has yet taken place, Príncipe, in particular, offers an excellent research opportunity due to its exceptional biodiversity, high level of endemism, recent human presence, small size, low population, and limited urban development.

With our research, we aim to shed light on the historical relationship, past and present, between humans and their environment in the archipelago. Following our earlier paleoecological fieldwork – the first of its kind on Príncipe – we are currently planning the first archaeological research on the island through an archaeological reconnaissance of the entire island using technologies like LiDAR, along with archaeological surveys and test excavations.

Paper short abstract:

Palaeoecological research has shed new light on the impact of people on tropical island’s biodiversity. Here we will discuss how and why island biodiversity changed during the years following human settlement with emphasis on rates of change and the introduction and spread of non-native taxa.

Paper long abstract:

Islands represent 6.67% of the planet emerging land, being home not only to 20% of the world’s biota, but also home to about 10% of the world’s human population, including Small Island Developing States (SIDS). Palaeoecological research has shed new light on the impact of people on tropical island’s biodiversity. In this talk we will discuss how and why island biodiversity changed significantly during the years following human settlement. For example, we will show evidences of an increase of rate of change and the role of people on the introduction and spread of non-native taxa.

Paper short abstract:

We discuss our work within the PANTROPOCENE project integrating archival analysis into land use models for the Philippine Archipelago prior to and throughout the Spanish Colonial Period (1565-1898), and how this novel methodology strengthens understandings of past land use and environmental change.

Paper long abstract:

Land Use Modelling (LUM), despite finding increasing acceptance amongst archaeologists, anthropologists, and political scientists, remains largely eschewed by historians. Here, we argue that LUM provides a platform and methodology for multidisciplinary collaboration that historians can contribute to and improve. For the last four years, the PANTROPOCENE project has worked to create land use models for the Philippine Islands just prior to and throughout the Spanish Colonial Period (1565-1898 CE). In this paper, we draw on our research integrating archival analysis into LUM to show how each can enrich the other and contribute to a deeper understanding of land use change and environmental practices in the past.

Paper short abstract:

We highlight the incredible speed of foreign private capital led to primeval forest destruction on the East Coast of Sumatra during the late 19th century. We use cadastral maps, aerial photographs, travel stories, and plantation enterprises journals to reconstruct land cover changes.

Paper long abstract:

Anthropocene and Capitalocene are still debated in figuring out the genesis of our environmental crisis. However, from the case of the East Coast of Sumatra, we find out that the main driver of tropical deforestation was the thriving plantation industry owned by foreign private capital and supported by the Dutch colonial government. The East Coast of Sumatra was once a terra incognita for the Dutch Colonial Government. It was a neglected region with massive primeval forest cover. However, the primitive accumulation by the European Entrepreneur during the Second Industrial Revolution caused an ecological shift in this region. It was demonstrated by the rapidity of land use change to create the so-called plantation region (cultuurgebied). The adaptation of shifting cultivation in tobacco plantations caused approximately 250.000 ha of primeval forest felling in the first 20 years of expansion. The number increased rapidly during the rubber boom, followed by the palm oil boom in the early 20th century, which led to 1.104.500 ha primeval and secondary forest conversion to plantation. By ensembling plantation expansion data annually from diverse historical sources, we aimed to reconstruct land cover change during the late 19th until early 20th century on the East Coast of Sumatra.

Paper short abstract:

This paper maps the history of rubber as a commodity, including its role in shaping state frontiers in the Amazon and Congo basins, its conversion into a plantation crop in Southeast Asia, the development of synthetic rubber, and the turn to sustainable wild rubber extraction in modern-day Brazil.

Paper long abstract:

This paper maps out the historical impacts of rubber as a commodity on Indigenous peoples, nation-state formation and tropical rainforests in South America, Central Africa and Southeast Asia. In the late nineteenth century, latex harvested from plants such as the Pará rubber tree in the Amazon rainforest, the Liana vine in the Congo rainforest and the Gutta-percha tree in the Malay Archipelago became a key component of industrial capitalist development.

While there have been many excellent regional studies of the rubber boom and associated genocides against Indigenous peoples in South America, this history has never been systematically and transnationally visualised. This study draws on material collected across regional archives in Peru, Bolivia, Colombia and Brazil to map out the expansion of rubber extraction and the consolidation of nation-state borders across the Amazon rainforest. Simultaneously, it catalogues the resistance techniques used by Indigenous groups in these regions, including evasion and direct conflict.

The paper will also analyse the parallel expansion of wild rubber extraction in the Congo basin; the subsequent eclipse of South American and African rubber production by the plantation system in Southeast Asia; and the development of synthetic rubber in the US and Germany during the Second World War. Plantation rubber production in Southeast Asia continues to be a leading driver of deforestation today, fuelling a new wave of capitalist expansion. In the Brazilian Amazon, contrastingly, traditional communities are now seeking to revive wild rubber extraction as a sustainable alternative to soy cultivation and cattle ranching, conserving the rainforest.

Paper short abstract:

We compare colonial and biocultural maps of abandoned villages in Gabon’s Ivindo forest using historic participatory mapping and GIS (1880s-present). Colonial and modern maps severely underrepresent forest history when compared to biocultural maps, invisibilising Bakota biocultural landuse.

Paper long abstract:

Additional authors: H. Assatsi, Emboukangoye, B., J. Epong, A. Embamenet, S. Ekazama Koto, G‐R. Ibembi Moandondo, Itsetsamé, P. Ihamboua, L. Ikakaboua‐Moazeonz, G. Kotomoukaye, B.L. A.S. Moimangombe, G. Mabomaya, D. Ngoapaza, C. Ngoubassèkoua, T. Mahombi Mokounga D. Louma, D. Mbazadjia, V.P. Malingui Toukou, F. Makala, S‐A. Madjamaza, J. Mako.

We compare colonial and biocultural maps of abandoned villages in Gabon’s Ivindo forest landscape. French colonial resettlement policy was enacted from the 1900s-1970s, leaving a legacy of abandoned villages. Recent processes seek to recognise some village territories. We ask how colonial and biocultural maps can foster recognition of settlement. We compare eight colonial-era and present-day maps with biocultural mapping of former settlements and sacred sites (1880s-2022). Kota members of Massaha village used historic participatory mapping to document their history. Using GIS, the colonial maps were digitised, compared with biocultural maps, and village layers were created. Colonial maps show no trace of settlement in the colonial era. By contrast, biocultural maps show 15 historic settlements and many sacred sites. Comparing colonial maps, which helped to plan railroads, source labour, and impose taxes, with a biocultural view of village historic settlement and heritage, we find the colonial and modern maps severely underrepresent forest history and invisibilise people’s territories and land stewardship. We conducted this exercise with a second community in the southern Ivindo forest with similar results. When we bring together different maps, we understand how Kota communities have been impacted by colonial resettlement policy and despite this, they maintain their biocultural land use.

Paper short abstract:

This paper adopts historical method to provide important linkage between the contemporary failures of sustainable development and environmental management in most cities in Africa (focus on Ibadan) with the gross urban maladministration of the past by the colonialists.

Paper long abstract:

On the surface, a research on urban environmental situations (urban planning, waste management and sanitation) in colonial Africa/Nigeria at first glance seems to have little to do with contemporary environmental challenges (e.g. unsustainability and climate change). However, as rightly noted by Jennifer Hart (2022): “if sustainable development and just, resilient cities are the goals of the future, we must first reckon with these structural inequalities of the past.” Environmental history that was characterized by acute urban segregation, gross mismanagement, infrastructural and sanitary failure in African cities like Ibadan help us better understand the contemporary proliferation of cities overwhelmed by air pollution, noise, traffic, waste, crime, racial tension, slum conditions, maladministration and many more across the continent. Despite its pre-colonial pre-eminence of the city, the arrival of the British in Ibadan in 1893 opened a completely new epoch in the environmental history and development of the city. Although, the city witnessed a number of unprecedented urban growth and expansion during this period so much that it could be concluded that modern Ibadan was a colonial creation but the haphazard nature of the growth seriously negated the outcomes of the colonial urbanism in Ibadan. This paper adopts historical method to provide important linkage between the contemporary failures of sustainable development and environmental mis-management in most cities in Africa (focus on Ibadan) with the gross urban maladministration of the past by the British colonialists.