Global Data Hound

by Jonathan Boright, Research Scientist, ISCIENCES, L.L.C.

On Staff at ISciences since 2006, Jonathan Boright uses GIS to create global-scale models of human-environment systems. His most recent work focuses on water stress resulting from both natural and human-induced changes to the terrestrial hydrologic cycle.

Looking at the world around us in new ways is what Geography Awareness Week is all about; Profs. Erle Ellis and Navin Ramankutty have taken a fresh look at how we view our planet.

Anthropogenic Biomes

In 2008, Ellis and Ramankutty introduced the concept of anthropogenic biomes (also called “anthromes”). They delineated 21 anthropogenic biomes based on population density, land use, and vegetation cover, and further grouped them into six major categories–dense settlements, villages, croplands, rangeland, forested and wildlands.^[1]

The six major categories of anthropogenic biomes

Their intriguing concept maps the terrestrial biosphere in its contemporary, human-altered form using global units defined by patterns of direct human interaction. The concept of anthropogenic biomes turns tradition on its head: a view of the world as a natural ecosystem with humans disturbing it changes to a perspective of human systems with natural ecosystems embedded within them. This thought-provoking view of our world has stirred up a bit of controversy.^{[2] [3]}

Conservationists have argued that re-interpreting the earth in a human-centric way could potentially put the natural world at even higher risk, creating acceptance for unmitigated human impact on finite resources. On the contrary, affirms Prof. Ellis: “We need to think of [the earth] as a human ecology; an ecology in which people interact with nature, and where we’re responsible for the way nature behaves now, and where we’ll be responsible for the way it behaves in the future.”^[2] (Prof. Ramankutty elaborates on the subject in this interview: http://mediasite.campus.mcgill.ca/ramankutty.mp3)

The concept of anthropogenic biomes, thus, emphasizes active responsibility on the part of humans interacting with ecosystems. Says Ellis, “the first thing you recognize when you look at the world, not just at biomes, is that everything is broken up by human activity. And you can look at this as a very simple world where you have agricultures,…forests and cities in one place, but in reality it is all mixed together.”^[2]

The Anthromes and Biomes of New England

In honor of Geography Awareness Week, I decided to bring the idea of anthromes closer to home by taking a look at how the classification plays out in my neck of the woods (New England). Looking at the anthromes map of New England, we can see a mixture of “urban” and “dense settlements” around the greater Boston area and other major population centers in the region. Moving away from these urban centers we see a mixture of “residential rainfed mosaic,” “populated forest,” and a few examples of “remote forest.” This analysis makes sense to me, corresponds well to my experience of the landscape, and seems to be an accurate representation of the current human/nature relationship.

Anthropogenic Biomes with focus on New England

In contrast, if we look at a traditional terrestrial biomes map of New England, we get an entirely different picture. The vast majority of New England is classified as “temperate broadleaf and mixed forests,” with small areas of “temperate conifer forests.” These fairly broad categories can be subdivided into ecoregions. My home in Vermont, for example, lies in the “New England acadian forest” ecoregion, which is itself composed of a mosaic of habitats (northern hardwood forests, coniferous forests, wetlands, bogs, etc.). The biome and ecoregion classification scheme gives us much more information about the potential ecology of a location, but little information on what actually exists at that location.

So which one is better?

While it is tempting to compare and contrast the relative strengths and weaknesses of anthromes vs. biomes, such a comparison misses the point that these classification schemes are simply two very different ways of mapping the planet. The traditional biomes classification tells us what our ecosystem would be in the absence of human interference, while the anthromes classification provides us with a map of the relationship between humans and the natural world.

I second Prof. Ellis’ view: “if we want to live in an environment that is desirable for all of us, it’s up to all of us to make it happen. It’s really the nature around us that matters now.” ^[2] These two schemes could (and should) be used in conjunction to better address the very formidable environmental challenges that our planet now faces.

Notes

^[1] Ellis, E. C. and N. Ramankutty. 2008. Putting people in the map: anthropogenic biomes of the world. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 6(8):439-447, doi:10.1890/070062. [Download]

^[2] Prof. Ellis introduced the concept of anthromes on the Discovery Channel video, “Human Influence on Ecology Mapped.” http://dsc.discovery.com/videos/earth-human-influence-on-ecology-mapped.html .

^[3] Deeper discussion of the concept can be found on the Anthromes project website, http://www.ecotope.org/projects/anthromes/ .

For recommended reading we also suggest People and Pixels: Linking Remote Sensing and Social Science, from the Committee on the Human Dimensions of Global Change, National Research Council.

TerraViva! GeoServer links:

For other maps that add perspective about human influence on Earth visit the TerraViva! GeoServer and take a look at GlobCover LandCover from ESA, and GPW Adjusted Population Density and Human Footprint from SEDAC.

GlobCover Land Cover v2 2008 (ESA) http://geoserver.isciences.com:8080/geonetwork/srv/en/metadata.show?id=228&currTab=simple

GPW v3 Adjusted Population Density 2000 (SEDAC) http://geoserver.isciences.com:8080/geonetwork/srv/en/metadata.show?id=187&currTab=simple

Human Footprint v2 2005 (SEDAC) http://geoserver.isciences.com:8080/geonetwork/srv/en/metadata.show?id=206&currTab=simple