Neoliberal Policy and Deforestation in Southeastern Mexico: An Assessment of the PROCAMPO Program

Abstract

A lingering question in economic geography is the degree to which there is a link between neoliberal policies and environmental degradation. Research is needed to relate such policies empirically to local‐level decision making, both to evaluate their consequences and to contribute to an understanding of how cross‐scalar dynamics drive processes of land‐use change. This study examines the environmental impacts of a Mexican rural support program, referred to by its Spanish acronym, PROCAMPO, which was introduced in 1994 as part of a comprehensive agenda to liberalize the agricultural sector. Using both descriptive analyses of the study region's political ecology and econometric modeling, we draw on a panel of farm‐household data spanning 1986–1997 to assess the impact of PROCAMPO on land‐use change in southeastern Mexico. The results indicate that the program has had the unintended effect of fostering deforestation and has led to an only modest increase in market production. These findings suggest that alternative mechanisms may be needed to achieve the market integration and agricultural modernization sought by neoliberal policies and that such policies may have to be restructured to avoid unintended environmental impacts. By connecting macro‐level economic phenomena with regional and local environmental impacts, this study addresses the linkages of cross‐scale human‐environment interaction.

Institutional support and in situ conservation in Mexico: biases against small-scale maize farmers in post-NAFTA agricultural policy

“…Researchers measured an increase in deforestation carried out by PROCAMPO recipients ranging from 6.5% to 38%, observing that Yucatán farmers used their PROCAMPO-supported lands to grow cash crops, such as Chili peppers, while subsistence crops like maize and beans were shifted to newly cleared fields. These findings provide support for broader analyses suggesting that, under economic liberalization policies, smallscale farmers' limited access to credit and purchased inputs makes it difficult for them to undertake intensification using existing agricultural resources (Klepeis and Vance 2003;Shriar 2002;Barbier 2000). These behavioral patterns are relevant to the discussion of in situ conservation 5 Initially, under the administration of Ernesto Zedillo (1994Zedillo ( -2000 these programs were introduced as Alianza para el campo.…”

“…A study of deforestation on the Yucatán peninsula (Klepeis and Vance 2003) suggests that the availability of PRO-CAMPO led to increasing levels of deforestation in the post-NAFTA period. Researchers measured an increase in deforestation carried out by PROCAMPO recipients ranging from 6.5% to 38%, observing that Yucatán farmers used their PROCAMPO-supported lands to grow cash crops, such as Chili peppers, while subsistence crops like maize and beans were shifted to newly cleared fields.…”

“…This nation-wide farm support program was explicitly designed to replace market-distorting, outputbased subsides while simultaneously cushioning farmers during the transition to free trade (Romero and Puyana 2006;Klepeis and Vance 2003). Based on the area planted to any of nine staple crops in one of 3 years before 1993, PROCAMPO provides a yearly, per-hectare subsidy, which is intended never to exceed the number of hectares planted in 1994.…”

Linking Remote Sensing, Census and Interview Data to Understand Forest Transitions in the Southern Cone of the State of Yucatán, México

“…A complex pattern of livelihood strategies also occurs in the southern region of the Yucatán Peninsula, including subsistence maize, commercial chili cultivation, wage labor, pasture production, and conservation land uses such as harvest of non-timber forest products (Chowdhury 2010, Dalle et al 2011. The hierarchical system of distribution that was implemented in the southern cone of the state of Yucatán as a result of a neoliberal federal policy also reveals the connections between local markets and global agricultural production, as does the increase in commercial chili pepper production in Campeche (Keys 2004, Klepeis & Vance 2003.…”

“…For example based on survey data from 1986-1997, Programa de Apoyos Directos al Campo (PRO-CAMPO), an agricultural program implemented in 1994 with the goal of integrating agricultural markets and intensifying production, revealed only modest increases in market production, but an increase in deforestation occurred through the conversion of land to commercial chili production and pastures (Klepeis & Vance 2003). A study based on household surveys carried out in 1997 and 2003 found that similar land use choices were being made by some, although others were choosing to withdraw from agriculture all together and those who converted their land to pasture or commercial agriculture were using less land than previously devoted to extensive agricultural practices, resulting in a decrease in deforestation (Busch & Geoghegan 2010, Radel et al 2010, Schmook & Radel 2008.…”