IS RURAL MIGRATION A THREAT TO ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY IN SOUTHERN BURKINA FASO? I. OUEDRAOGO 1 * , P. SAVADOGO 1,2 , M. TIGABU 1 , R. COLE 3 , P. C. ODE ´ N 1 AND J.-M. OUADBA 2 1 Southern Swedish Forest Research Center, Tropical Silviculture and Seed Laboratory, Swedish, University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), PO Box 49 SE-230 53 Alnarp, Sweden 2 De ´partement Productions Forestie `res, Institut de l’Environnement et de Recherches Agricoles, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique et Technologique, 03 BP 7047, Ouagadougou 03, Burkina Faso 3 Geography and Planning Department, Grand Valley State University, 1154 Au Sable Hall, Allendale, Michigan (MI) 49410-9403, USA Received 8 September 2008; Revised 5 January 2009; Accepted 6 January 2009 ABSTRACT There is growing evidence that population pressure on the land has become the most intractable problem in the developing countries where demand for food exceeds the food production capacity of the land. Southern Burkina Faso has experienced rapid population growth, mostly driven by immigration of farmers. This study was carried out in Sissili Province and used satellite images acquired over 31-year period, census and survey data to capture migration patterns and its impacts on land use change. Results showed that migrant population which accounted for only 3 per cent in the study area in 1976 shifted to 57 per cent in 2007. Migrant people were using improved technology to progressively convert forest land to cropland. Cropland increased at an annualized rate of 046 per cent to the detriment of the dense forest and woodland which decreased at 057 per cent per annum. Population growth was highly correlated with increasing area of cropland (r 2 ¼ 095, p ¼ 0014) and declining dense forest (r 2 ¼ 078) and woodland (r 2 ¼ 095) covers. It can be concluded that rural migration, driven by the relatively good soil and rainfall conditions in the recipient area, is accounted for deforestation in the study area. If rural migration is not checked, it will seriously degrade the environment. Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. key words: Burkina Faso; migration; land use change; population growth; wood cutting; fuel wood INTRODUCTION Thoughts on population–environment interactions have many historical antecedents, but neo-Malthusian and Boserupian notions are pre-eminent (Perz et al., 2005; Perz et al., 2006). Malthus (1798) argued that population growth leads to agricultural expansion and ultimately to land degradation and famine. This statement was later supported by Ehrlich (1968), Hardin (1968) and Meadows et al. (1972). Alternative approaches have emerged since Boseru ¨p (1965) and Simon (1980) showed that population growth leads to sustainable land use via intensification due to technological improvement. More recently, Bilsborrow (2002) articulated the third possibility of a demographic-economic response via migration from crowded or degraded environments to frontier zones. New thoughts also emerge that the effect of population on environment depends on many things, including a gamut of cultural and political factors as well as the scale of observation (Gibson et al., 2000; Wood, 2002; Perz et al., 2005). In the tropics, rapid population growth constitutes the main force of change in land use (Ramankutty and Foley, 1999). Population growth in developing countries is generally associated with increased demand for food and fuelwood and also increased rural migration, which lead to high rates of forest losses (Lambin et al., 2003). Migration, in its various forms, is known to be the most important demographic factor causing land use change at time scale (Geist and Lambin, 2001; Lambin et al., 2003), operating as a significant driver with other non-demographic factors such as policies, consumption patterns, economic dynamics and globalization (Fearnside, 1997). land degradation & development Land Degrad. Develop. 20: 217–230 (2009) Published online 2 March 2009 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/ldr.910 *Correspondence to: I. Ouedraogo, Southern Swedish Forest Research Center, Tropical Silviculture and Seed Laboratory, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), PO Box 49 SE-230 53 Alnarp, Sweden. E-mail: issa.ouedraogo@ess.slu.se Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.