What Drives Deforestation and What Stops It? A Meta-Analysis

This article presents a meta-analysis of what drives deforestation and what stops it, based on a comprehensive database of 121 spatially explicit econometric studies of deforestation published in peer-reviewed academic journals from 1996 to 2013. We found that forests are more likely to be cleared in locations where the economic returns to agriculture are higher, due to either more favorable climatologic and topographic conditions or lower costs of clearing forests and transporting products to markets. Timber activity, land tenure security, community forest management, and community demographics are not consistently associated with either higher or lower deforestation. Population is consistently associated with greater deforestation and poverty is consistently associated with lower deforestation. However, in both cases it is difficult to infer a causal link because of endogeneity. Based on the results of the meta-analysis, we suggest promising approaches for stopping deforestation, including reducing the expansion of road networks into remote forested areas, targeting protected areas in regions where forests face a greater threat, and insulating the forest frontier from the demand for agricultural commodities. There is preliminary evidence that enforcing forest protection laws, supporting continued forest management by indigenous peoples, and payments for ecosystem services (PES) may also stop deforestation.