Human Health and Land Use Change

Expanding agriculture and climate change have direct impacts on human health and well-being.

The human health impacts of intensive agriculture on farmers, laborers and citizens are significant. Here we leverage our detailed land use and supply chain data to better understand what this means in the Brazilian Amazon and beyond. We have identified forced labor practices on cattle ranches that sell into international markets and are working to help companies to trace and reduce these practices. We also track the expansion of intensive agriculture and assess how the use of pesticides has impacted cancer rates, particularly with soy expansion in Brazil, along with the unequal impacts of global climate change around the world. We are now studying the opportunity costs and social impacts of conservation policies for smallholders across Latin America.