Effects of shifting cultivation and forest fire

Fire has always been apparent to some extent in humid tropical forest as an agent of disturbance leading to forest renewal through succession and even to long-term changes in the biome (Flenley, 1979; 1992; 1998). Under climatic conditions of forest fires occurring without human interference (Goldammer, 1992) although this is difficult to establish because the use of fire also links back to the earliest forms of agriculture (Boserup, 1965; Steensberg, 1993). Today however, the role of man is more evident than ever before in understanding the dynamics of fire, humans and vegetation ecology (Uhl, 1998).
Perceptions by lowlanders of a loss of ‘forest catchment functions’ due to ‘upland shifting cultivators’ are often strong but these may not be based on a clear understanding of the cause-effect chains involved.