Abstract:
Context Historical land use policies can have enduring impacts on contemporary patterns of land use.
However, the role of legacy land use policies on contemporary patterns of land use has been understudied
especially in agropastoral landscapes that support the
livelihoods of millions of people globally.
Objectives In this study, we investigated four distinct historical land policy trajectories in agropastoral landscapes in Narok County, southern Kenya, and
how they have shaped spatial patterns of land use
over more than four decades.Methods A spatially explicit historical land use
policy map was used to guide comparisons of land
change beginning with a landscape baseline (circa
1974) derived from historical aerial photographs as
well as a time series of Landsat-derived maps (1990,
2000, 2010, 2018).
Results Results showed that post-colonial land tenure policies diferentially infuenced the pace and patterns of land use transitions across the landscape. Collectively, private ownership was associated with large
reductions of forest (− 96%) and rangelands (− 40%)
due to the expansion of croplands (+60%), especially
after 2010. In the initial years, forest and rangeland
fragmentation coincided with areas under privatization policies, whereas group ranches tended to exhibit
greater homogenization alongside the disappearance
of small forest patches. In the recent years, private
lands become increasingly homogeneous as cropland
aggregate while group ranches become fragmented
following cropland expansion.
Conclusions The changes in spatial patterns afect
livelihoods of agropastoralists, either by modifying
habitat availability or movement that supports adaptive capacity during periods of stress. Because policy
legacies continue to shape land use trajectories and
patterns, the study suggests that integrating policy
analysis into landscape ecological research is critical
for interpreting contemporary landscape services.
