Chapter 7
Human Dimensions of Environmental Change in Siberia Kathleen M. Bergen, Stephanie K. Hitztaler, Vyacheslav I. Kharuk, Olga N. Krankina, Tatiana V. Loboda, Tingting Zhao, Herman H. Shugart, and Goquing Sun
Abstract This chapter provides background on socioeconomic contexts followed by synthesis of remote sensing-based case studies highlighting major human influences on the Siberian landscape during three eras: Soviet (1917–1991), early post-Soviet transformation (starting after 1991), and recent/emerging. During 1975–2001, Landsat-based LCLUC data in East Siberia showed characteristic patterns including: high rates of logging during the Soviet era that declined abruptly and remained low after 1989, a decline in agriculture (and subsequent reforestation) beginning prior to 1991, and a decline in mature conifer and increase in deciduous forest. In the far north, multiple remote sensing data over time demonstrated the degradation and mortality of the larch forests surrounding the Norilsk nickel mining complex. In East Siberia, multiple remote sensing data showed that oil and gas reconnaissance
K.M. Bergen (*) • S.K. Hitztaler School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA e-mail:
[email protected] V.I. Kharuk V.N. Sukachev Institute of Forest, Siberian Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences, Krasnoyarsk, Academgorodok, Russia O.N. Krankina College of Forestry, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA T.V. Loboda Department of Geographical Sciences, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA T. Zhao Department of Geography, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA H.H. Shugart Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA G. Sun Department of Geographical Sciences, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA P.Ya. Groisman and G. Gutman (eds.), Regional Environmental Changes in Siberia and Their Global Consequences, Springer Environmental Science and Engineering, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-4569-8_7, © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
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directly disturb the landscape but that their indirect influence on increased fire occurrence is of greater consequence. Along the Siberia-China Amur River border, replanting and the almost complete removal of mature conifer are evident in Landsat data on the Chinese side, whereas fire predominates on the Siberian side. In the recent/emerging era, LCLUC in Siberia is being influenced by greater transnationalism and increased demand for wood from other Asian countries. Oil and gas development is shifting to East Siberia. Pipelines and infrastructure are being built across Siberian lands directly to the Pacific and to China. Remote sensing–based analyses have been integral to increased knowledge of past and emerging trends in human dimensions of environmental change across the vast geographic region of Siberia.
7.1
Introduction
Many important environmental changes in regions of the world are ultimately driven by changes in human activities. Environmental changes have been associated with human drivers ranging from gradual historical settlement and development, major shifts in political and socioeconomic paradigms, changes in resource management institutions, to local human adaptation strategies. In Siberia, all of these drivers and their consequences have shaped and continue to influence the environment over time, and over the region’s vast and varied geographic extent. The purpose of this chapter is to characterize both human dimensions and environmental changes in Siberia and to provide evidence of their interrelationships through synthesis of completed scientific case studies. Human dimensions of environmental change could be considered from a number of different fields and perspectives. This chapter (and its case studies in particular) focuses on environmental changes that have been observed directly or indirectly via spaceborne remote sensing. Given that Siberia is a predominantly forested region and that its primary socioeconomic activities center on exploitation of forests, energy, and mineral resources, a representative balance of human dimensions of environmental change related to these resources is emphasized. Synthesis case studies selected for inclusion were largely conducted at the landscape level and where dominant human drivers of change were clearly present. Because there have been dramatic political and socioeconomic shifts in Siberia over the past century, the fundamental organization of this chapter is designed to investigate and compare human dimensions of environmental change in Siberia by political and socioeconomic eras. Specific chapter sections and organization are as follows: Section 7.1 provides definitions and sets the stage for the investigation of the human dimensions of environmental change in Siberian Russia. It is followed by three sections representing roughly chronological eras delineated as: Soviet (1917–1991, Sect. 7.2), early post-Soviet transformation (starting after 1991, Sect. 7.3), and recent/emerging (Sect. 7.4). The information in Sects. 7.2, 7.3, and 7.4 is structured such that, first, a more detailed context of human dimensions (specifically demographics, institutions, and resource management) that define each particular era is provided. This background is followed in Sects. 7.2, 7.3, and 7.4 by
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synthesis case studies on human-influenced land-cover and environmental change, emphasizing what has been observed and quantified via landscape-level remote sensing. Section 7.5 provides a brief summary and conclusions. Because the primary focus of this chapter is on human dimensions, treatment of socio-economics and environmental change is given equal emphasis.
7.1.1
Research on Human Dimensions of Environmental Change in Siberia
Global change came to the fore as a field in the 1990s through increased efforts by the scientific community to understand the sources and sinks of global carbon. Within this field, inquiry into human dimensions of environmental change has focused on the human drivers and consequences which influence or alter, either singularly or in combination, the biosphere, atmosphere, and hydrosphere. Some human drivers and consequences of global change may be direct (e.g., the addition of carbon to the atmosphere from internal combustion engines); however, research has shown that many complex humandriven environmental changes (including those that affect CO2 in the atmosphere) have their basis in land-cover and land-use changes (Houghton et al. 2004; Houghton 1995; Vitousek 1994). Interest in this component we now call land-cover/land-use change is not new (Marsh 1885; Thomas 1956; Turner 1990) but has grown in sophistication of theory, methods, and programs over time (Gutman et al. 2004). Satellite remote sensing data which became available to environmental scientists in the 1970s have been instrumental in more accurate and consistent characterization of land-cover change trends. Today, most land-cover/land-use studies using remote sensing data are undertaken with some combination of field data, socioeconomic data, and modeling methods (Brown et al. 2004; Janetos 2004; Turner et al. 2004; Rindfuss et al. 2004). Over the past several decades, the US and other national and international organizations have become active in the programmatic investigation of human dimensions of environmental change and land-cover/land-use change over global regions. These include the NASA Land-Cover Land-Use Change (LCLUC) Program and the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme’s (IGBP) core projects, such as Land Use and Cover Change (LUCC) and its continuation, the Global Land Project (GLP). The NASA LCLUC research program uses NASA and other primarily spaceborne sensors to observe many global environments, and has focused on both human and natural drivers and consequences of changes in forests, agriculture, natural and managed grasslands, wetlands, lakes, and urban systems (Gutman et al. 2004). In the late 1990s, several NASA LCLUC project teams began working with organizations in Russia to quantify and understand the past, present, and future land-cover and land-use trends within the Russian Federation. Bergen et al. (2003) reviewed objectives and results of these early research projects in this region in four categories: forest and landcover dynamics, fire and fire behavior, carbon budgets, and new remote sensing analysis methods. Krankina et al. (2004) focused on early results from three intensive case study sites in western Russia, central Siberia, and the Russian Far East (RFE).
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Presently, NASA LCLUC research in Russia related to human dimensions of environmental change also continues as part of the broader NEESPI program (Northern Eurasia Earth Science Partnership Initiative; Groisman et al. 2009). NEESPI focuses on research projects in Northern Eurasia and operates in partnership with academia, government agencies from the United States, Russian Federation, Europe, and Japan and with international programs such as IGBP and others (Gutman 2007). Gutman and Reissell (2011) have compiled results of NEESPI-related research in their book focused specifically on land-cover/land-use and climate change in the Eurasian Arctic (generally above 60° latitude), which includes northern Siberia. Also involved in assessing human-driven environmental change in Russia are several Institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences (including the Sukachev Institute of Forests in Krasnoyarsk), the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Austria (Shvidenko et al. 2007), the IGBP GLP, and the European Commission Joint Research Center (JRC) in Ispra, Italy, among others. Investigations from these research programs form the basis of the case studies syntheses in this chapter.
7.1.2
Historical Human Dimensions: Leading up to the Soviet Era
Prior to the Soviet era (and the era of aerial photography and satellite imagery), humans had been altering the Siberian landscape. The legacy of these activities includes the present-day patterns of settlement and infrastructure (Fig. 7.1), summarized in Chap. 1, as well as their influence on ongoing environmental changes. Given the challenges of Siberian terrain and climate (vast distances, cold temperatures, and permafrost soils), one may well ask how its large and important cities, continent-spanning transportation routes, and expansive industrial and forestry development come to be established. In addition to the geographies of terrain and climate, the other important factor influencing present human population patterns of Siberia is historical expansion. This has consisted of immigration and migration, increasingly associated over the centuries not only with nation-building and military concerns but also with the presence and locations of natural resources and the development of those resources (Table 7.1). Russia calls itself the nation that “looks both east and west” (symbolized by the east-west facing double eagles on its historic national emblem). Siberia was occupied prior to the thirteenth century by differing groups of indigenous peoples, some of whose ethnic groups remain part of the Siberian population today (e.g., Yakuts, Buryats). The southern fringes of Siberian lands were conquered by the Mongols of the East early in the thirteenth century who subsequently established the Siberian Khanate, which persisted until the sixteenth century when Russia to the west became a growing power. The first major groups of peoples to expand eastward from Russia were the Cossacks who sought Siberia’s natural resources for hunting, fishing, and agriculture. The Cossacks were also led by the spirit of exploration and adventure and, along with the Russian army, established military and trading stations (ostrogs), some of which remain the sites of important present-day cities.
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Fig. 7.1 Map of Siberia showing: geography including land, oceans, and major rivers; human dimensions including regions of the Russian Federation, federal provinces of Siberia, cities, rail transportation, and major east-west pipelines; locations of synthesis case study sites: Norilsk mining (A, purple), central Siberian LCLUC (B, green), central East Siberian oilfields (C, orange), and Amur LCLUC (D, blue) (University of Michigan, School of Natural Resources and Environment, Environmental Spatial Analysis Laboratory)
Following the Cossacks, peasants from Russia migrated to Siberia in search of land and agricultural livelihoods free from the suppression of feudal landlords (pomeshchiks). Siberia also attracted “Old Believers,” Russian Orthodox Christians who did not accept the church reforms of the seventeenth century, and were persecuted by the government and the official Church. Still, by the mid-seventeenth century, the population of ethnic Russians in what is present-day Siberia amounted to probably 75 % of dying and dead trees), (2) heavily damaged (51–75 %), (3) moderately damaged (26–50 %), (4) slightly damaged (
