Household demographic and socio-economic predictors of agricultural practices, land use and environmental degradation perception of the Paute catchment (Ecuador)

This paper seeks to improve the understanding of the household-level population dynamics (life-cycle) and their relationship, through livelihood strategies, to environmental change (agricultural practices, land use and perception of land degradation) focusing on long-settled communities of the Ecuadorian Andes, and considering external as well internal migration (impacts on origin place) as one of the most influencing factors.
The current research carried out a survey on the three pilot areas (May and June 2011) for generating primary data, obtaining 239 households surveyed. Generated data have been analyzed by applying statistical independence (Chi squared, and V Cramer test) analysis.

The findings advance our understanding of the complex demographic dynamics in the Andes region in three ways: 1) they show that a group of important demographic as well as socio-economic factors are necessary to properly explain the complex dynamics of important agricultural practices, land use and perception of land degradation factors; and 2) they show that migration (internal and/or external) plays a weak influence on the different studied dynamics. And 3) together, the theoretical framework and the dependencies findings imply a broader conclusion: the relevance of demographic and socio-economic on agricultural practices, land use and perception of land degradation variables extends beyond a focus on macro-level factors to those operating at the household life-cycle level.