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Agriculture and Human Values 21: 171–179, 2004.
© 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
Ladino and Q’eqch´
ı Maya land use and land clearing in the Sierra de
Lacand´
on National Park, Pet´
en, Guatemala
David L. Carr
University of California, Santa Barbara, California, USA
Accepted in revised form July 15, 2003
Abstract. This paper examines potential differences in land use between Q’eqchí Maya and Ladino (Spanish
speakers of mixed ancestry) farmers in a remote agricultural frontier in northern Petén, Guatemala. The research
site, the Sierra de Lacandón National Park (SLNP), is a core conservation zone of Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere
Reserve (MBR). In recent years, much has been written about the dramatic process of colonization and deforesta-
tion in Petén, Guatemala’s largest and northernmost department. Since the early 1980s a rapid rural transformation
has occurred where once remote forested regions have been colonized by small farmers, and lands have been
converted to maize fields and cattle pastures. Consequently, less than half of the original forest cover in the
department remains. Although approximately half of Petén’s rural settlers have been Q’eqchí Maya, their land
use, and its subsequent impact on Petenero forests, has been little studied. Results suggest that despite heterogen-
eous land use systems in migrant origin areas, given similar physical and socio-economic conditions following
settlement in this remote frontier, Q’eqchí and Ladino farmer land use is remarkably similar. Only a modest land
use difference appears to exist between the two groups: Q’eqchí Maya appear to have more extensive swidden
maize rotations while Ladinos dedicate more land to pasture.
Key words: Agricultural frontier, Central America, Guatemala, Land use and land cover change (LUCC), Maya
Biosphere Reserve, Pet´
en, Q’eqch´
ı Maya, Rural migration, Tropical deforestation
Abbreviations: SLNP – Sierra de Lacand´
on National Park; MBR – Maya Biosphere Reserve; INTA – The
National Institute for Agrarian Reform
David Carr is an Assistant Professor of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara, as of
July 2004. David received his PhD in Geography at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill in May of
2002. He received several fellowships for his dissertation research on population, land use, and deforestation
in the Sierra de Lacand ´
on National Park (SLNP), and on migration from origin areas throughout Guatemala
to the SLNP. Sponsors included NASA, Fulbright-Hays, RAND, the Mellon Foundation, and The Institute for
the Study of World Politics. Prior to joining the faculty at UCSB, David was a NIH post-doctoral fellow in the
Department of Biostatistics and the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina, where
he collaborated on research on population and environment dynamics in the Ecuadorian Amazon. During his
post-doctoral fellowship, he also continued to investigate population and environment processes in Guatemala
with sponsorship from a Mellon Foundation grant and a Paul Humphrey Award.
Introduction
This article examines potential land use differences
between Q’eqchí Maya and Ladino (Spanish speakers
of mixed ancestry) colonist farmer land use in the
Sierra de Lacandón National Park (SLNP), a core
conservation zone of Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere
Reserve (MBR) (Figure 1). An ample literature
describes the process of colonization and land use
in Petén, the largest and northernmost department
of Guatemala (Schwartz, 1995; Valenzuela, 1996;
Grandia, 2000; Grunberg, 2000). Massive in-migra-
tion has swelled Petén’s population from a few small
rubber tapping colonies in the 1960s to well over
half a million inhabitants by the late 1990s, while
approximately half the forests in the region have been
converted to agriculture. Nearly half of Petén’s inhab-
itants are Q’eqchí, yet we know relatively little about
how this group’s land use compares to Ladino land
use and their respective contributions to deforestation
in Petén. Examining land use differences between the
two groups is necessary for understanding the relative
importance of ethnicity and place in reference to fron-
tier land use. This knowledge, in turn, may inform the
172 DAV I D L. CARR
Figure 1. Guatemala’s Sierra de Lacand ´
on Natonal Park (SLNP) and Maya Biosphere Reserve (MBR). Source:DavidCarrandthe
Nature Conservancy.
development of methods for improving rural welfare
and reducing the impact of colonist agriculture on the
Petenero forests.
The Q’eqchí survived for centuries as semi-
nomadic swidden farmers among the rich valleys of the
Verapaces in Central Guatemala. But by the mid-19th
century, virtually all of the best farmland in the region
was seized – mostly by German expatriates – to invig-
orate the booming coffee export industry. The Q’eqchí
were subsequently relegated to farm rugged moun-
tain slopes and indentured into seasonal servitude on
coffee plantations. The continued splintering of small
farms due to continued land consolidation, the highest
rural fertility in Central America, and inadequate
seasonal labor on coffee and cardamom plantations, all
conspired to spur a massive out-migration of families
in search of land (Valenzuela, 1996; Carr, 2002).
Consequently, in just the last two to three decades,
the region of Q’eqchí monolingualism has extended
widely – far northward into the forested regions of
Petén, to the south into the department of Izabal, and
westward into Belize. This diaspora meant that, even
as the language remained the 8th most spoken Maya
language in Guatemala little over a decade ago, by the
mid 1980s, the geographical area inhabited by Q’eqchí
speakers had exceeded that of all Guatemalan Maya
groups. Continued high fertility and rural isolation
has increased the population of Q’eqchí speakers such
that today only Quiché is spoken by more Guatemalan
Maya.
The scant information published on Q’eqchí land
use in Petén suggests that this group may have a rela-
tively great impact on environmental degradation in
the region. Atran (1993), for example, found that
Q’eqchí farmers in the buffer zone of the MBR cleared
more forest and engaged in fewer soil conservation
techniques than their Maya Itzá neighbors. Recent
research by Fagan (2000) in a core conservation zone
of the MBR, the Laguna del Tigre National Park
(LTNP), corroborates Atran’s position. Fagan relates
that the two largest Q’eqchí communities in the PNLT
were settled in remote, thickly forested areas that have
been rapidly deforested due to low intensity, expansive
corn farming.
Similarly, to the south of Petén, in Guatemala’s
largest protected area, the Sierra de las Minas
National Park (SMNP), Castellon (1996) reports
that Q’eqchí settlement deep within the park and
farmers’ subsequent land management are a primary
cause of the destruction of the park’s forest canopy.
Throughout the SMNP, households had adopted
intensive cardamom production for export. Yet defor-
estation rates accelerated nonetheless as virtually
all households simultaneously retained a multi-field
SIERRA DE LACAND ´
ON NAT I O NA L PARK,PET ´
EN,GUATEMALA 173
maize rotation, exacerbated by steep, degraded slopes
– the only land available for many recent colonists.
In sum, the modest literature that exists on the
subject generally agrees that Q’eqchí migrants tend to
settle remote agricultural frontiers, clearing large plots
of unoccupied forest land to engage in an extensive
maize swidden.
However, some suggest that environmentally
destructive Q’eqchí land use in Petén may be influ-
enced by Ladino neighbors. Macz and Grunberg
(1999), for example, note that there is a difference
between more traditional Q’eqchí settlement – agar-
radas comunales directed by elders that look to rees-
tablish the relationship with the tz’uultaq’a, or earth
god – and the increasingly common Ladino pattern of
agarradas familiars:
The [family agarrada] group does not respect the
rules of good land use, which can be observed on
plots that no longer have trees and they also have no
interest in accepting advice on forest management,
etc., offered by the representatives of organizations
that work in Petén.
When referring to a more “traditional” Q’eqchí
land use, Macz and Grunberg invoke a culture-land
relationship portrayed in Wilson’s Maya Resurgence
in Guatemala (1995). Wilson discussed how among
traditional Q’eqchí communities in Alta Verapaz, iden-
tity is intimately linked to the 13 mountains that form
cardinal points ringing the Q’eqchí homeland. Land
management in traditional Q’eqchí communities is
governed by the local tz’uul taq’as to which farmers
pay homage. Permission is requested to clear forest
and to plant corn – which is “loaned” to the Q’eqchí
farmer. Care is taken to minimize the human impact
on the environment and to avoid clearing forest that
covers the mountain home of the local deity. Wilson
explains,
Traditional Q’eqchísay that the mountains are living
(yo’ yo). They have the quality of wiinqilal or
“personhood,” a concept that applies only to moun-
tains and people. The tzuultaq’as are spirits that
have a human form and live in a “house” ...inside
the mountain. Yet the mountain is also the physical
body of a tzuultaq’a. (p. 53)
One informant of Wilson’s added,
A tzuultaq’a feels pain when we clear the brush with
machetes and jab the planting sticks into the earth.
(p. 54)
According to Wilson, among the Q’eqchí, such
relations to mountain deities are highly localized.
Therefore, unlike the universal human-land relation-
ship conceptualized by Incadescendants in the Andean
cult of the Pa c h a M ama, within the Q’eqchí cosmovi-
sion, the bond between human and mountain spirit is
sundered when humans move to another region.
What land use patterns arise then among Q’eqchí
colonists dislocated from their traditional homeland
in the forest fringes of Petén, and how might these
patterns compare to Ladino land use? Are Q’eqchí
colonist farmers, as some suggest, more destructive
of the forest than Ladino farmers? Or, following
frontier settlement, do they continue more conser-
vative farming techniques consonant with origin land
use traditions and the cult of the tzuultaq’a?This
study compares farm and household characteristics
to examine what, if any, are the differences in land
use between the two groups in eight communities in
the SLNP, and what factors may explain the patterns
observed.
The research site: the Sierra de Lacandón National
Park
Much attention has been focused on the ecological
devastation of the Brazilian Amazon. Yet from 1990
to 1995, although the absolute amount of forest cleared
was much less than in Brazil, the rate of forest clearing
in Central America outpaced Brazil’s rate by almost
six times. At 2% per annum, Guatemala ranked among
the world’s top twenty countries in percentage of
forests cleared during the first half of the 1990s (World
Bank, 2001). This is particularly significant given that
only five of the other nations of greatest deforestation
during this time period had any sizable forest cover (at
least 10,000 km2) at the beginning of the 1990s (the
others, nations such as El Salvador and Haiti, had only
sparse vestiges of forest remaining).
Most of Guatemala’s recent forest loss has occurred
in the vast departamento (similar to a US state)
of Petén, most of this at the hands of migrant
farmers. Approximately half of this population is
comprised of Q’eqchí Maya farmers and agricultural
laborers. Deforestation has been particularly swift
during recent years in the Maya Biosphere Reserve,
an area covering 2,113 km2, representing almost 60%
of Petén and 20% of national territory. The research
site for this study, the Sierra de Lacandón National
Park (SLNP), is a core conservation zone of the MBR.
The second largest national park in Guatemala, the
SLNP boasts the richest biodiversity in the MBR and
is the sole biological corridor linking the MBR and
the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve – the largest
protected lowland tropical forest in Mexico (The
Nature Conservancy, 1997). Despite its biological
174 DAV I D L. CARR
Figure 2. Q’eqch´
ı Maya waiting for the bus on the recently
paved Ruta a Naranjo which runs adjacent to the SLNP.
importance and its designation as a core conservation
zone, the SLNP experiences some of the highest rates
of population growth, land invasions, and agricultural
expansion in Petén (Sader et al., 2000). The rural
economy revolves around subsistence maize produc-
tion. Most of the settlers arrived in the Park since
1988. Following decades of high internal displace-
ment due to a protracted civil war, Q’eqchí coloniz-
ation of the park increased during the 1990s, and the
Q’eqchí now represent an estimated 20% of the park’s
approximately 15,000 inhabitants (Carr, 2000).
Methods
Fieldwork was undertaken by the author in 1997
and 1998. The data is derived from surveys with 33
Q’eqchí household heads and 186 Ladino household
heads in 8 communities (Figures 2 and 3 respectively).
The eight communities selected represent a geograph-
ically stratified selection of the 28 communities with
farmland in the park. Similarly, the ratio of Q’eqchí to
Ladino households interviewed represents an approx-
imation of this ethnic distribution among the park’s
inhabitants. Differences between the two groups are
assessed with t-tests and chi-square tests based on a
host of demographic, socio/political-economic, and
ecological factors.
Farm and land use characteristics examined
included farm size, and the number of hectares in
forest, cleared land, fallow, maize, beans and other
crops, and pasture. Several household characteristics
are hypothesized to influence these land uses (Carr,
2004). These include household demographics (Cain,
1984; Perz, 2001; Carr and Pan, 2002), land tenure
status (Schmink, 1992; Forster and Stanfield, 1993),
education level of the head of household (Panayatou,
1994), contact with NGOs or GOs (Pichón, 1996), and
distance to a road and duration on the farm (Rudel,
1983; Jones, 1990). Smaller (and older) household
Figure 3. A Ladino family with a cattle corral in the back-
ground.
size, secure land tenure, greater education level of the
head of household, and greater contact with NGOs or
GOs are hypothesized to have a negative relation to
forest clearing. Distance to a road and duration on the
farm are expected to have a positive effect on forest
clearing.
Agricultural intensification is examined as a func-
tion of the following variables: the number of years
cornfields are cropped, the distance between maize
rows and stalks, and the use of fertilizers, pesti-
cides, and the nitrogen-fixing legume, velvet bean
(mucuna pruriens). Greater intensification is anticip-
ated to be associated with less overall forest conver-
sion (Boserup, 1965; Bilsborrow, 1987). Farm soil
quality and topography are used as measures of farm
land quality. Good quality soil and flat terrain are
hypothesized to contribute to enhanced and sustained
yields and less erosion, all factors that should attenuate
deforestation.
Results
Household characteristics
Virtually all the household heads in both Ladino and
Q’eqchí communities cultivate maize, working over 50
hours a week on average to support large households
(Table 1). Although approximately 80% of maize
produced is sold to market, most farmers barely break
even when even modest production and transportation
costs are included (Carr, 2002). Some research has
suggested that larger households may sow more land in
crops in semi-subsistence economies than do smaller
households (Schutjer and Stokes, 1982; Cain, 1984).
However, with no variation between the two groups
in household size, this relationship cannot be eval-
uated here. For both groups, the average household
size of approximately 6.5 members is particularly high
considering that colonist families tend to be younger
SIERRA DE LACAND ´
ON NAT I O NA L PARK,PET ´
EN,GUATEMALA 175
Table 1. Household characteristics.
Ladino Q’eqch´
ı
Farms as primary job 97% 94%
Hours worked per week (head of hh) 56.5 58.0
Household size 6.5 6.5
Members of household/Caballer´
ıa 8.3 9.3
(unweighted)
All household members/males > 11 2.0 1.8
Average number of year schooling 2.1 1.8
(head of hh)
Contact with GO or NGO (head of hh) 41% 39%
Durationonthefarm
∗9.5 6.9
n = 186 n = 33
∗Significant at the 0.05 level.
than families in longer settled regions; young people
migrate more readily to the frontier than do the elderly
(see, e.g., Sekhar, 1993). Guatemala has the highest
rural fertility rate in Latin America, yet average family
size at the national level for rural areas (5.6) is still
one household member fewer than the average in this
(relatively youthful) sample for the SLNP (Instituto
Nacional de Estadistica, 1999).
The population density of the households (defined
as number of household members per one caballería of
land) was modestly greater among the Q’eqchí than
among Ladinos due to the slightly smaller size of
Q’eqchí farms, and there are nearly two consumers
to every producer among both groups. The National
Institute for Agrarian Reform (INTA) established the
caballería (45 hectares) as the standard for peasant
settlement in the 1950s. Early colonists to the park
seized a caballería or more and farmers still invoke
it as the amount of land that is necessary for subsist-
ence. Today, both groups possess slightly under
one caballería per family, suggesting incipient plot
fragmentation.
Most heads of household either never entered
primary school or completed just a few years before
dropping out. The education level of the heads
of household is therefore lower than the national
average in each of the two groups. In rural areas of
Guatemala, nearly half of household heads interviewed
by the National Institute for Statistics (INE) in 1998
had completed primary school (Instituto Nacional de
Estadistica, 1999). This may support a selection for
lower educated migrants to rural areas as opposed
to cities and international destinations as found by
Carvajal in the Dominican Republic (Carvajal and
Geithman, 1976). Lastly, it appears that institutions
have thus far had little impact on most farmers’ land
use. Despite millions of dollars invested on conserva-
tion and sustainable development in the MBR under
the multinational Mayarema Project, more than half of
both groups claimed never to have had contact with
a GO or NGO worker. Lastly, of the household char-
acteristics measured, the only significant difference
between the two groups is their average duration on
the farm. Ladinos have been on their farm an average
of almost ten years compared to nearly seven years for
Q’eqchí households.
In summary, despite great cultural and linguistic
differences, the household characteristics of the two
groups are strikingly similar. Indeed, the data suggest
Ladinos and Q’eqchí share more features with one
another than with their ethnic cohorts in their regions
of origin. This finding highlights the importance of
place and suggests that the relatively homogenous
frontier environment of the SLNP may be a more influ-
ential determinant of household characteristics than
ethnicity.
Land quality and land ownership
The two groups also share similar farm ecologies
(Table 2). A slightly greater percentage of Ladinos
reported degraded, unusable land. However, most
farmers reported having slightly more mediocre and
poor soil than very good soil, while a little more than
half of the plots in both groups are situated on at least
partially hilly terrain.
Land ownership status, however, does differ
notably between the two groups. In the absence of
legal titling within the core zone of the park, most
of the park’s inhabitants are squatters. But whereas
only two-thirds of Ladinos are squatters, over 80%
of Q’eqchí have no legal claim to their farm. This
finding is consistent with the tendency of the Q’eqchí
to settle remote, unoccupied forests, as noted by
several scholars. The more remote settlement pattern
of the Q’eqchí also helps explain the finding that, while
nearly a quarter of the Ladinos rented land, only 4 of
33 Q’eqchí in the sample reported renting land. Land
is rented only where there is a demand for it, almost
exclusively in the longer settled, more population-
dense, and predominantly Ladino fringes of the two
principle access roads to the park.
Farm characteristics and land allocation
Following the discussion above, the difference in the
distance in kilometers to a year-round road between
the two groups, 8.0 km. for the Q’eqchí and 5.6 km.
for the Ladinos, is statistically significant at the 0.01
level (Table 3). Since most land within several kilo-
meters of the principal roads was fully claimed by
the early 1990s, settlers to the park have had to
176 DAV I D L. CARR
Table 2. Land quality and land ownership.
Ladino Q’eqch´
ı
Very fertile soils 39% 36%
Mediocre or poor soils 59% 48%
Hilly or partially hilly terrain 53% 55%
Unusable land 12% 9%
No legal claim to their farm∗∗ 67% 82%
Rents land∗24% 12%
Contact with GO or NGO (head of hh) 41% 39%
n= 186 n=33
∗Significant at the 0.15 level.
∗∗Significant at the 0.10 level.
Table 3. Farm characteristics and land allocation (ha.).
Ladino Q’eqch´
ı
Farm distance to a primary road (km)∗5.6 8.0
Total land 48.9 43.8
Total land cleared 13.8 12.9
Forest 35.1 30.9
Fallow 6.9 7.2
Corn 5.0 4.9
Beans or other crops 0.5 0.6
Percent with beans or other crops 33% 36%
Pasture∗1.4 0.2
Percent with cattle 24% 21%
n= 186 n=33
∗Significant at the 0.05 level.
choose between renting land near the road or claiming
unoccupied land further within the park. It appears
that the Q’eqchí have tended to opt for the latter.
Invariably, farmers claimed that higher transportation
costs, coupled with abundant forestland character-
istic of their remote locations, encouraged agricultural
expansion. As one Q’eqchí farmer noted, “with such
high costs to transport crops to the road and with
prices so low, we have to expand our milpas [cropland,
usually dominated by maize] in order to keep up with
falling production.” With substantial land, and scarce
capital and surplus labor for investing in intensifica-
tion, agricultural extensification is the logical choice
for increasing maize production in the park. In this
regard, Q’eqchí farmers in the SLNP are quite similar
to frontier farmers in Amazon frontier regions (e.g.,
Hecht and Cockburn, 1989; Pichón, 1997).
Yet, they are also quite similar to their Ladino
neighbors. There is no statistical difference between
the two groups in any land use except pasture. The
typical farmer in both groups possesses between 40
and 50 hectares of land with 10 to 15 hectares of land
cleared, the rest remaining in forest. The amount of
land in corn (approximately 5 ha.), beans, and other
crops (approximately 0.5 ha.) and fallow (approxi-
mately 7 ha.) remains almost identical between the two
groups.
The average amount of land in corn for the entire
sample is comparable to the estimated 5.5 hectares
in two of the largest Q’eqchí villages in the Parque
Nacional Laguna del Tigre where maize is also the
only crop grown in any abundance. Yet SLNP farmers,
both Q’eqchí and Ladino, are cultivating considerably
more maize than the 2 to 4 hectares that Castellon
observed for Q’eqchí farmers in the SMNP who were
allocating a portion of their land to the cash crop
cardamom. Further, the extensive fallows of the SLNP
Q’eqchí sharply contrast with the land poverty of
Alta Verapaz, where most households are landless or
possess scarcely a hectare or two.
There are, however, two interesting potential differ-
ences in land use between the Q’eqchí and Ladino
settlers. First, the data suggest prima facie that the
Q’eqchí are clearing forest for milpa at a faster pace
than Ladinos. If frontier farms evolve through a similar
process of land use over time, then we would expect
that farms settled earlier would be more likely to
have completed the fallow rotation. Yet even though
Q’eqchí farmers had an average duration on the farm
of 2.6 years less than Ladino farmers, the difference
in land cleared between the two groups was statist-
ically insignificant. However, since forest clearing
tends to be greater during the initial years of settle-
ment, the difference in pace of forest clearing between
the two groups may be less extreme than a tempor-
ally linear interpretation of the data would suggest
(see, e.g., Mather, 1992; Brondizio et al., 2002). For
example, (although the small sub-sample precludes
any conclusive assertions), the average amount of land
cleared by the 18 Ladino farmers in the sample with
7 years on the farm (to compare with the Q’eqchí
mean of 6.9) was 12.8 hectares, virtually identical to
the Q’eqchí mean (12.9). Yet Ladino farmers with
seven years on the farm had only 5.7 hectares of
fallow, approximately 30% less than the Q’eqchí
mean, providing tentative support for a longer fallow
swidden for maize production among the Q’eqchí.
Nevertheless, given that most land remains in forest
on the farms in the sample, both groups are in a posi-
tion to clear significantly more forest than they have to
date (and presumably will do so if secondary forest is
considered insufficient or less desirable than primary
forest).
Secondly, although approximately one quarter of
each group reported owning cattle, Ladinos with live-
SIERRA DE LACAND ´
ON NAT I O NA L PARK,PET ´
EN,GUATEMALA 177
stock had several times more land in pasture than did
Q’eqchí farmers with cattle. As observed in Brazil
and in other parts of Latin America, the extent to
which land-demanding livestock is embraced by fron-
tier farmers may have greater implications on future
deforestation than differences in crop management
(e.g., Nations, 1992; Hecht, 1993).
In summary, the two groups appear to be allocating
farmland almost identically, with several hectares in
maize, several more in fallow, and most remaining in
forest. The land use is comparably extensive relative
to other frontier environments in Guatemala and much
more so relative to migrant areas of origin in longer-
settled regions of the country (Carr, 2002). That the
Q’eqchí had cleared as much land as the Ladinos
in less time suggests a slightly faster pace of forest
clearing within the milpa fallow rotation. But the
greater amount of land allocated to pasture among the
Ladinos suggests future deforestation could be greater
among Ladinos if differences between the two groups
in pasture conversion continue to widen.
Farm management and intensification
Consistent with the abundance of forest reserves
remaining on their farms and their extensive fallow
rotations, both the Q’eqchí and Ladino households
employed relatively little agricultural intensification
on their farms. Both groups appear to have minimal
variability in cropping intervals and in crop density
(Table 4). On average, both Q’eqchí and Ladinos tend
to grow crops for two years and leave one to two
meters of distance between rows and stalks. Consonant
with a frontier environment of land abundance, this
cropping pattern is much less dense than in colonist’s
origin areas where farmers tend to plant at 1 meter
distance or less (Carr, 2002).
One type of intensification was popular in the
region; velvet bean (mucuna pruriens) was cropped by
approximately one-third of the farmers in each group.
Mucuna is a nitrogen-fixing legume that has been
known to double corn production during the second
annual harvest when farmers can fetch higher prices
(Mausolff and Ferber, 1995). Because the mucuna
maize field is spatially fixed, only the field used for
the first maize harvest is part of the swidden system,
compressing the crop rotation, and mitigating forest
clearing.
Little variation is apparent between the two groups
in terms of fertilizer, herbicide, and insecticide use.
Nearly half of all farmers apply herbicides, but fertil-
izers are costly and unnecessary in the multi-field
swidden practiced by most farmers. The difference
between the two groups in terms of insecticide use
Table 4. Farm management and intensification.
Ladino Q’eqch´
ı
Years land is cropped 2.0 2.2
Space between rows and stalks 1.7 1.6
Velvet bean 37% 36%
Fertilizers 7% 6%
Herbicides 43% 36%
Insecticides∗3% 0%
n = 186 n = 33
∗Significant at the 0.05 level.
was statistically significant, but this finding must be
interpreted in the context of very scant overall use (five
Ladinos and zero Q’eqchí in the sample).
Summary and discussion
Some research has suggested that the Q’eqchí are
more destructive of the forest environment than other
ethnic groups farming in Petén. However, the data
presented here suggest that, given similar physical
and socio-economic conditions, Q’eqchí farmers are
quite similar to their Ladino counterparts. Most of the
farmers are squatting illegally on park land. Despite
the fact that more Q’eqchí are squatters, they do not
clear significantly more forest as some of the rural
land title literature would suggest (Deacon, 1999;
Thiesenhusen, 1991). Rather, the greater level of
land titling among Ladinos facilitates the adoption of
cattle; land title is necessary for bank credit, which
many farmers invest in cattle. Virtually all cropland
is sown in maize – both groups crop approximately
5 hectares – and, with an average of 7 hectares in
fallow, both groups manage a “bush fallow” swidden
(Boserup, 1965). Households are uniformly large and
farm plots appear to be similar in their ecological
characteristics.
There are some differences between the two groups
worth noting. First, the significantly greater distance to
a year-round road among Q’eqchí farmers supports the
notion that this group tends to settle remote forested
regions. The greater proportion of Q’eqchí plots
that are squatter farms, and the significantly smaller
percentage of Q’eqchí that rent land, are consistent
with this finding; only remote areas of the park offer
access to unclaimed land and there is little need to rent
farm plots in remote areas of land abundance. Second,
a slightly greater portion of Q’eqchí farms were defor-
ested at the time of the data collection even though they
tended to have settled their plots an average of nearly
three years later than Ladino farmers. Thus, there is
178 DAV I D L. CARR
some evidence to support that the Q’eqchí are clearing
forest at a greater rate than Ladinos for crops and that
their forest clearing is disproportionately located in
areas of relatively intact, old-growth forest. However,
since forest clearing tends to be greater during the
initial years of settlement, the difference in pace of
forest clearing between the two groups appears insig-
nificant. More importantly, the fact that most land
remains in forest on both Q’eqchí and Ladino farms
signals the potential for substantial forest clearing
among both groups.
As in the LTNP and the SMNP, in the SLNP
Q’eqchí farmers have tended to settle remote regions
and cleared forest at a rapid pace to open up land
for milpa agriculture. This land use contrasts with
traditional Q’eqchí conceptions of land and farming
in their homeland and supports Wilson’s assertion of
the importance of locale-based identification – and
of a sundered symbiosis with the local environment
among those who colonize other lands. Conversely,
the Ladino proclivity to raise cattle in their regions of
origin is evident in the more vigorous pasture expan-
sion in the SLNP among Ladinos and augurs a poten-
tial acceleration in forest clearing among farmers in
this group.
Conclusion
Over half of Petén’s forests have been eliminated
during the past forty years. Most of the forest elimina-
tion was caused by Ladino and Q’eqchí small farmers,
the two main groups inhabiting the Petén. Differences
between Q’eqchí and Ladino colonists merit recogni-
tion by researchers and conservation and development
organizations. Most remaining forested land in the
region is located in the MBR. With an average of
greater than 30 hectares of forest remaining on the
farms studied in the SLNP, a core zone of the MBR,
as well as unclaimed forested areas deeper within the
park, the potential for continued deforestation is great
among both groups.
In future years, human land use in the SLNP may
impact the environment in several ways. On the eve
of the new millennium, a paved road had just been
completed, linking the SLNP to Campeche state in
Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala City to the south.
Similar to many colonization frontiers in the Amazon,
the primary road to the SLNP was initially constructed
for oil exploration. The discovery of new petroleum
deposits could prompt further road building, opening
up new frontiers for colonist agriculture. Improved
road access, and thus increased land rents, could
encourage land consolidation, meaning cattle ranching
on the one hand or more intensive perennials for
market on the other could become the main drivers of
land cover change in the area. Or road access could
accelerate colonization, expanding the milpa frontier
further into the park. The data suggest that Ladinos
may be more likely to be involved in the former,
Q’eqchí in the latter outcome. At the time of data
collection, however, it appeared that place – charac-
terized by great land availability, lack of market access
and rural underdevelopment – had a greater impact on
land use than did ethnicity. Q’eqchí and Ladino land
use was much more similar to each other than to their
own land use before migrating to the SLNP. Few of the
Q’eqchí or Ladino farmers cleared more than a hectare
or two of forest before settling the forest margins of
the SLNP (Carr, 1999). Indeed, colonization of the
SLNP was largely a response to acute land scarcity
(Carr, 2002).
Limiting access to forest land, discouraging the
adoption of livestock, particularly in consonance
with land titling programs, encouraging more diverse
and intensive agricultural practices, and promoting
rural development such as improved education, health
care (including reproductive health), and alternative
employment may be effective policies to help temper
forest clearing among both Ladinos and Q’eqchí. The
successful implementation of such policies will respect
the cultural mores and land use ecologies particular
to each. But policy makers must recognize that some-
times land use differences may be better understood by
factors inherent in the shared conditions of place more
than differences in the people inhabiting that place.
Lastly, recognizing that most agricultural expansion
is caused by recent colonists to agricultural frontiers,
land use policies in Petén aimed at forest conserva-
tion and sustainable development may be doomed to
failure without the reconciliation of resource inequities
in colonist’s communities of origin – whether Ladino
or Q’eqchí.
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Address for correspondence: David L. Carr, Geography Depart-
ment, University of California – Santa Barbara, 3611 Ellison
Hall, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
E-mail: carr@geog.ucsb.edu
