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Bar plot: (a) Gross domestic product (GDP) by states and region (unit: 10 12 Kyats). (b) Per capita GDP by state and region (unit: million Kyats).
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National circumstances should be considered in establishing and adjusting forest reference emission levels (FRELs/FRLs) under the United Nations Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (UN-REDD+ Programme). Myanmar, one of the world’s least developed countries may face accelerating deforestation under an open and d...
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Citations
... Intuitively, we would expect the opposite: an inverse relationship between socioeconomic development and environmental impact. However, it has been reported that deforestation rates increase with the rise of socioeconomic indicators (Michinaka et al. 2020). In this sense, it is argued that the relationship between socioeconomic indicators and environmental issues behaves like a Kuznets curve (Stern 2004), where there is an initial phase where the relationship is positive, as we have detected, and in a second phase it becomes negative (Cropper et al. 1999). ...
Measuring environmental degradation with bioindicators, landscape metrics, and remote sensing helps understand impact on biota. However, data on anthropogenic pressures such as plant exploitation, poaching and invasive species are crucial. We created an Anthropogenic Influence Index (AII) for medium and large mammals at the Atlantic Forest based on local environmental quality indicators and tested its correlation with existing indices, such as the Global Human Influence Index (GHII), landscape metrics and social-economic indicators. We found no correlation between the AII and the GHII, indicating that remote sensing-collected data may not reflect local and specific anthropogenic impacts on the environment. In addition, there was a correlation between the AII and the Human Development Index, drawing attention to the direct relationship between income, education and life expectancy and the incidence of environmental impacts. Thus, the AII appears to better capture local nuances of environmental impacts, particularly those significant for medium and large mammals, compared to other indicators such as GHII, human density, and landscape metrics.
... Based on environmental variables, it is projected that in a world that is 2.0 °C hotter, by 2100 or sooner, bat hosts of sarcoviruses may shift to Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and India, countries that account for the highest number of suitable hosts [26]. In some of these countries, population growth and economic development have resulted in greater deforestation [27] and land use changes, whereas among the remaining wildlife, the prevalence of coronavirus increases directly because of human impact [28]. ...
The global warming our generation is experiencing is just one of the great environmental crises of the Anthropocene, a geological period that began with the use of fossil fuels and that, in merely one century and a few decades of industrial activity, has altered ecosystemic processes that sustain human health and well-being. Beyond the loss of the "intrinsic value of nature", changes in the magnitude and direction of biogeochemical cycles and increases in temperature are phenomena that not only accompany the loss of habitats and species but impair resilience by ultimately generating greater and more complex numbers and types of exposures that constitute a danger to human health. In this study, we attempted to offer some notes about the margin, understood as that space with the greatest inequity and therefore the fastest growth of risk: the collision area where deprivation marks the social determinants of health and where the greatest interaction with causes of disease occur.
... Recent work has shown that Myanmar's government structures are changing rapidly in response to natural disasters. It is an urgent priority in their fight against climate change (Gilfillan, 2019) and to cushion the impact of deforestation (Michinaka et al., 2020). ...
Plain language summary
This work aims to analyse the evolution and concentration of studies on the issue of Least Developed Countries to detect the topics that researchers have most discussed. These are matters of great economic and social importance, affecting two-thirds of the planet. It analyses the work and research carried out to detect how these countries can achieve sustained economic growth with full use of their capacities, allowing access to new forms of production that could generate products and activities with greater added value. The work is therefore structured as follows: First, a description is given of the characteristics of LDCs and the different initiatives that have been taken over the last 50 years to reduce poverty and improve their socio-economic situation. Secondly, following the analysis carried out in the first part, it describes the problems that prevent LDCs from progressing in their objectives and highlights the main contributions in the existing literature on the subject. This is a summary of the different perspectives and theories that attempt to explain the problems related to LDCs, the most appropriate model designs that have been proposed, the most successful strategies, the validity of the data used, on which the conclusions of the studies will depend. Thirdly, we apply a bibliometric analysis of the works that have addressed the issue of LDCs. This method includes the topics that have been dealt with the most, the trend followed by these publications, the concentration of authors and the responses that scientific journals offer on LDCs. It should be noted that this is one of the few research studies to have used this methodology to address this issue. This article is of great interest to experts, public institutions and researchers sensitive to problems of such great importance and so widespread that they affect a large part of the world population.
... In developed places, the relationship between NV areas and economic growth tends to be direct (Zambrano-Monserrate et al., 2018;Tsiantikoudis et al., 2019;Benedek and Fertő, 2020), whereas within poor or developing places, this relationship seems to be inverse (Epule et al., 2014;Michinaka et al., 2020;Banerjee et al., 2021). In Brazil, its most developed region (i.e., Southeast) shows similar pattern to that observed within poor locations in the world (Ewers, 2006), thus, the following questions are arised: Is the Brazilian Southeast a good model for the country's developement? ...
... Based on environmental variables, it is projected that in a world that is 2.0 °C hotter, by 2100 or sooner, bat hosts of sarbecoviruses may shift to Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and India, countries that account for the highest number of suitable hosts (Muylaert et al., 2022). In some of these countries, population growth and economic development have resulted in greater deforestation (Michinaka et al., 2020) and land use changes, whereas among the remaining wild life, the prevalence of coronavirus increases directly because of human impact (Warmuth et al., 2023). ...
The global warming our generation is experiencing is just one of the great environmental crises of the Anthropocene, a geological period that began with the use of fossil fuels and that, in merely one century and a few decades of industrial activity, has altered ecosystemic processes that sustain human health and well-being. Beyond the loss of the "intrinsic value of nature", changes in the magnitude and direction of biogeochemical cycles and increases in temperature are phenomena that not only accompany the loss of habitats and species but impair resilience by ultimately generating greater and more complex numbers and types of exposures that constitute a danger to human health. In this study, we attempted to offer some notes about the margin, understood as that space with the greatest inequity and therefore the fastest growth of risk: the collision area where deprivation marks the social determinants of health and where the greatest interaction with causes of disease occur.
... And deforestation rate is also expected to increase as the human population and economy grow (Michinaka et al. 2020). Studies of NTFPs in Myanmar have focused on the income that rural communities derive from NTFP production and trade but research examining the ecological impacts of NTFP production are fewer by comparison. ...
The relationship between non-timber forest products (NTFPs) and deforestation can determine the extent to which the livelihoods of individuals in resource-dependent communities can be sustained and the strategies to conserve the forest for sustainable utilization. Here, the relationship between deforestation and commercial production of the NTFPs from natural forests in Myanmar was examined. We performed multiple regression to predict the deforestation from different type of NTFPs and demographic factors. Population density is the most contributing factors to deforestation while fuel wood production and diversity of wood extractive NTFPs were significant among the different groups of NTFPs to predict deforestation (R²＝0.421, p<001). The commercial production of wood extracts was interestingly found as a promising factor that can reduce deforestation. Shifting the market demand to the extractive products from woody trees can maintain the forests for the sustainable use to secure the rural livelihood. Capacity building on the harvesting skill and processing of the wood extracts become crucial in conservation of the host trees. Market chain analysis of the products in optimizing commercial value of the products as well as information on the resource availability are not the least to be considered in NTFPs commercialization and sustainable forest management.
... Deforestation and forest degradation are typically the results of economic, institutional, technological, cultural, and demographic factors (Geist and Lambin 2002). In the case of Myanmar, extraction of wood, mining and hydropower development, weak land tenure, environment-related policies and regulations, corruption, infrastructure development, and economic development are regarded as the causes of deforestation (Bhagwat et al. 2017;Lim et al. 2017;Michinaka 2020), with expansion of agriculture being one of the main drivers . ...
... Future economic development for Myanmar, which is predicted to lead to deforestation and degradation, involves a diverse set of stakeholders, socioeconomics (e.g., population increase and price increase) and natural environment (e.g., deforestation and forest degradation) surrounding the forest resources (Michinaka 2020). In other words, forestdependent community with different generations of first migrants, their next generation and second migrants has diverse demands on forest resources, such as self-consumption, selling native NTFPs to the domestic market, introducing cash-crop (e.g., turmeric and konjac) for international market and others. ...
Forest resources have the potential to act as a safety net for those who live in or migrate to rural areas. The aim of this study was to assess the difference in dependence on forest resources between first generation migrants and their descendants in a village in the southern Shan State of Myanmar that includes different ethnic groups and has experienced population growth. Their perceptions of collective action for sustainable forest resource management were also analyzed. Primary data were collected through semi-structured interviews with households, interviews with key informants, and focus group discussions. The first generation had a greater diversity of income sources than the second generation; in addition, households that earned income from non-timber forest products (NTFPs) were found to have a lower total annual income than those that did not, across the generations. This result demonstrates the function of NTFPs as a safety net for rural migrants whose livelihood is dependent on forest resources. Furthermore, participation by first and second generation migrants in collective action for sustainable forest resource management was found to be low. Rather, the heterogeneity of villagers should be taken into consideration by policy makers and implementing agencies for sustainable forest resource governance.
... Due to the economic and political isolation of Myanmar over the past 70 years, as well as internal conflicts in some regions, it retains a higher amount of native forest and the largest areas of unfragmented forest ecosystems in the region [22]. However, Myanmar is one of the least developed countries in Asia and, along with the rapid socio-economic development, it is facing accelerating deforestation under a more open and democratic political system [23,24]. The transformation of land use from subsistence to commercial agricultural production has accelerated since the late 1980s: oil palm concessions in southern Myanmar and rubber plantations in south-eastern Myanmar (Tanintharyi Division, Mon State, and Kayin State) have had significant impacts on biodiversity [23,25]. ...
Protected areas are the backbone of biodiversity conservation but are fixed in space and vulnerable to anthropogenic climate change. Myanmar is exceptionally rich in biodiversity but has a small protected area system. This study aimed to assess the potential vulnerability of this system to climate change. In the absence of good biodiversity data, we used a spatial modeling approach based on a statistically derived bioclimatic stratification (the Global Environmental Stratification, GEnS) to understand the spatial implications of projected climate change for Myanmar's protected area system by 2050 and 2070. Nine bioclimatic zones and 41 strata were recognized in Myanmar, but their representation in the protected area system varied greatly, with the driest zones especially underrepresented. Under climate change, most zones will shift upslope, with some protected areas projected to change entirely to a new bioclimate. Potential impacts on biodiversity include mountaintop extinctions of species endemic to isolated peaks, loss of climate specialists from small protected areas and those with little elevational range, and woody encroachment into savannas and open forests as a result of both climate change and rising atmospheric CO2. Myanmar needs larger, better connected, and more representative protected areas, but political, social, and economic problems make this difficult.
Implementation of a measuring, reporting, and verifying (MRV) framework is essential for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+). According to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, MRV can be regarded as an important mechanism to mitigate global warming. Upland Myanmar, with an elevation of ~80–2600 m, is experiencing tropical deforestation, which is commonly explained by the expansion of shifting cultivation. The vegetation change tracker algorithm, with its high-automation and wild-adaptation
features, and the enhanced integrated forest z-score were applied in this elevation-based study of time series deforestation monitoring in upland Myanmar using data from 2003 to 2015. Four spatial patterns of deforestation, namely stripes, adjacent, filled, and staggered, were found in the research area. Moreover, our work showed that the center of elevation of deforestation was ~1000 m. Further analysis revealed that this center tended to shift to a higher elevation over time; a “golden cross”/changeover could be deciphered at ~1000 m, indicating that the scale and intensity of shifting cultivation continue to expand vertically. The results suggest the need to track the elevation-based signature of vegetation clearings to help achieve the goals of REDD+ at the regional level in tropical rainforest countries.
