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In the south-west of Mauritania, the present provinces of Brakna and Trarza stem from the history of the pre-colonial emirates of the same names. This paper quotes the few but various data at our disposal concerning the landscape history and vegetation and climate evolution during the last centuries. We propose a diachronic approach of this area, to identify the part of the heritage in the current landscape and usefully enlighten environmental and development issues. We can thus identify the main features of the precolonial landscapes of this region as well as the historical roots of the production systems and put into perspective their recent evolutions. Beyond its historical interest, this knowledge can also be one of the grounds of the current environmental approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the south-west of Mauritania, the present provinces of Brakna and Trarza stem from the history of the pre-colonial emirates of the same names. This paper quotes the few but various data at our disposal concerning the landscape history and vegetation and climate evolution during the last centuries. We propose a diachronic approach of this area, to identify the part of the heritage in the current landscape and usefully enlighten environmental and development issues. We can thus identify the main features of the precolonial landscapes of this region as well as the historical roots of the production systems and put into perspective their recent evolutions. Beyond its historical interest, this knowledge can also be one of the grounds of the current environmental approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research on the mutations of colonial agrarian landscapes aims to provide historical-geographical knowledge on their transformations and evolutionary tendencies during sultan, colonial and postcolonial periods. To achieve it, archive, multidata images and field data were collected, organized, analyzed and compared. It is clear from this that more than 40 years after the Independence, the plantations and the factories which constituted the great symbols of the agrarian colonization are either almost erased from the landscape or in a state of ruin. Of the more than 17 species introduced to Anjouan by Europeans as part of the plantation economy, only clove, ylang-ylang and vanilla are today export and industrial crops. As for traditional food crops, they are part of the agrarian landscapes that are currently under urban pressure. In compensation, Anjouan is subject to agriculture in forest areas. These landscape transformations went together with positive and negative effects as regards socio-spatial, socio-economic and environmental aspects. Among them, there were cases of expropriation, retrocession and land conflicts; rural exodus and migration; duality and complementarity between traditional agricultural economies of self-sufficiency and plantations of capitalist type; export crops as main sources of family incomes; deforestation and degradation of river flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research on the mutations of colonial agrarian landscapes aims to provide historical-geo- graphical knowledge on their transformations and evolutionary tendencies during sultan, colonial and postcolonial periods. To achieve it, archive, multidata images and field data were collected, organized, analyzed and compared. It is clear from this that more than 40 years after the Independence, the plantations and the factories which constituted the great symbols of the agrarian colonization are either almost erased from the landscape or in a state of ruin. Of the more than 17 species introduced to Anjouan by Europeans as part of the plantation economy, only clove, ylang-ylang and vanilla are today export and industrial crops. As for traditional food crops, they are part of the agrarian landscapes that are currently under urban pressure. In compensation, Anjouan is subject to agriculture in forest areas. These landscape transformations went together with positive and negative effects as regards socio-spatial, socio-economic and environmental aspects. Among them, there were cases of expropriation, retrocession and land conflicts; rural exodus and migration; duality and complementarity between traditional agricultural economies of self-sufficiency and plantations of capitalist type; export crops as main sources of family incomes; deforestation and degradation of river flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]