Land‐use change from market responses to oil palm intensification in Indonesia.

Lim, Felix K. S.; Carrasco, Luis Roman; Edwards, David P.; McHardy, Jolian

Land‐use change from market responses to oil palm intensification in Indonesia.

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Journal article

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Lim, Felix K. S.

Carrasco, Luis Roman

Edwards, David P.

McHardy, Jolian

Date published

September 26, 2023

Abstract

Oil palm is a major driver of tropical deforestation. A key intervention proposed to reduce the footprint of oil palm is intensifying production to free up spare land for nature, yet the indirect land‐use implications of intensification through market forces are poorly understood. We used a spatially explicit land‐rent modeling framework to characterize the supply and demand of oil palm in Indonesia under multiple yield improvement and demand elasticity scenarios and explored how shifts in market equilibria alter projections of crop expansion. Oil palm supply was sensitive to crop prices and yield improvements. Across all our scenarios, intensification raised agricultural rents and lowered the effectiveness of reductions in crop expansion. Increased yields lowered oil palm prices, but these price‐drops were not sufficient to prevent further cropland expansion from increased agricultural rents under a range of price elasticities of demand. Crucially, we found that agricultural intensification might only result in land being spared when the demand relationship was highly inelastic and crop prices were very low (i.e., a 70% price reduction). Under this scenario, the extent of land spared (∼0.32 million ha) was countered by the continued establishment of new plantations (∼1.04 million ha). Oil palm intensification in Indonesia could exacerbate current pressures on its imperiled biodiversity and should be deployed with stronger spatial planning and enforcement to prevent further cropland expansion. 油棕农业是热带森林砍伐的主要原因。许多研究提倡集约化农业生产以减少土地使用, 但我们并不清楚市场反应如何间接影响土地使用。我们使用空间显式经济租金模型来了解印度尼西亚油棕的供需情况。我们分析了在不同的需求的价格弹性,农业生产率的提高如何改变市场均衡以及我们对种植园扩张的预测。油棕的供应对价格变化和生产力的提高非常敏感。在我们所有的模拟中, 集约化增加了经济租金, 从而增加了扩张的可能性。在不同的需求价格弹性下, 油棕产量的增加导致价格下降。但由于经济租金上涨, 我们仍然看到农业扩张。我们需要需求的价格弹性非常缺乏弹性, 并降低油棕价格(70％)以减少土地使用。然而, 在该模拟中, 节省的土地面积(约 32 万公顷)仍然被不断建立的新种植园(约 104 万公顷)所抵消。印度尼西亚油棕农业的集约化可能会对生物多样性产生负面影响, 需要谨慎实施, 以防止种植园进一步扩张。