Sub-national Forest Transitions: A matter of scale and regional drivers?

Knowledge of forest cover development (de-/reforestation) and its drivers is a precondition for designing effective land use planning and policies to halt deforestation not only national, but especially at sub-/ or regional-scale. The forest transition hypothesis concept has been used to examine the development of forest cover decline and re-expansion. Depending on the scale and drivers considered, the concept supports the identification of policy and forest management options that can lead to more productive and sustainable forest landscapes. However, whether the approach also produces useful results at sub-national level has not received much attention to date. The presented study analyses the forest cover development on sub-national scale for the case of Philippines to assess the existence of a subnational pattern of forest transition patterns. Sub-national administrative units up to municipality-level were taken into account and analysed according to biophysical conditions (e.g. topography, soil types), demographic (e.g. population density and growth) and other (socio-)economic drivers. The study investigates whether a pattern of forest cover development exists across scales and regions or whether different pathways of influencing drivers exist on different scales for the case of Philippines. Findings will be compared with similar assessments conducted for the case of Ecuador and Zambia, respectively.