Contribution of Campesino Reserve Zones - Zonas de Reserva Campesina Reducing Deforestation in Colombia

Throughout history, Colombian peasant movements have highlighted biological conservation as part of traditional agricultural practices and peasant culture. Peasant Reserve Zones (PRZ) are areas under communal systems of land management by peasant/campesino communities. One of the stated objectives of PRZs is to become territories where biodiversity conservation is implemented along with agricultural production. In order to explore the contribution of Peasant Reserve Zones to biodiversity conservation, this study aims to evaluate whether PRZs are effective strategies to reduce deforestation. In order to test the effect of PRZ, we compared the deforestation rates from 2002 and 2018, inside PRZ versus outside areas within a buffer of 30 km from the boundaries of each reserve. In order to ensure that the areas in and out of Peasant Reserve zones are comparable, we performed Propensity Score Matching (PSM) and Mahalanobis Distance Matching (MDM) to select pixels with similar characteristics to those within the PRZ. These pixels where selected according to the covariates that influence the location of the ZRC and deforestation as distance to roads, rivers, creeks, human settlements, coca plantations, slope, and biome. Deforestation was predicted using a Generalized Linear Mixed Model (GLMM). Our results shows a significantly lower probability of deforestation inside the PRZ. This study concludes that peasant reserves are effective to reduce deforestation, despite the lack of an official designation of these areas as part of the national system of protected areas. Such evidence justifies the implementation of incentives that acknowledge the contribution of Peasant Reserve Zones as land management systems that support environmental protection.