Rural–urbanmobility influences wildmeat access and consumption in the Brazilian Amazon P ATRICIA CARIGNANO TORRES,CARLA MORS E L L O and L UKE PARR Y


Abstract Research demonstrates substantial urban con- sumption of wildmeat and the existence of trade networks in the Brazilian Amazon. Yet rural–urban mobility persists in this urbanized region, with the circulation of people, goods and ideas, blurring boundaries between rural and urban lives. Here we examined the relationships between rural–urban mobility and wildmeat access in highly forested areas of central Brazilian Amazonia. We surveyed 798 urban households in four towns and 311 rural households in 63 riverine communities. Rural–urban mobility was common amongst urban households: 49.7% maintained rural livelihoods and 57.3% were headed by rural in-migrants. Although many urban consumers purchased wildmeat, gift- ing was equally important. Urban households with greater rural–urban mobility consumed more wildmeat and were less likely to purchase it. Buying wildmeat was rare in rural areas but emergent in larger rural communities. Rural consumption was greater in remote areas, non-flood- plain communities and during the high-water season. Urban populations placed particular pressure on three preferred species: the lowland paca Cuniculus paca, tapir Tapirus terrestris and white-lipped peccary Tayassu pecari. Rural consumption was more diverse, and per-capita wild- meat consumption was four times greater in rural than urban households (21 vs 5 kg/person/year). Total estimated annual wildmeat consumption was 3,732 t across 43 riverine urban centres compared to 11,351 t in surrounding rural areas. Because of poverty in these towns and socially mediated wildmeat acquisition, it is debatable whether urban consumers should or could be denied access to wild- meat. Nonetheless, the probable future increase in urban demand and related risks to sustainable, equitable resource use necessitate the monitoring and management of rural– urban wildmeat flows.


Keywords Bushmeat, sharing, sustainability, tropical forests, wildlife conservation, wildmeat


Supplementary material for this article is available at doi.org/10.1017/S0030605321001575


Introduction


tions that rural depopulation leads to net conservation ben- efits (Wright&Muller-Landau, 2006). For instance, in West and Central Africa, population growth and urbanization have increased urban demand for wildmeat, with wide- spread markets and informal trade negatively affecting wild- life (van Vliet et al., 2019; Luiselli et al., 2020). In Peru, wildmeat trade in a large urban market has increased in par- allel with urban population growth since 1973 (Mayor et al., 2021). Wildmeat demand contributes to defaunation around Amazonian towns (Parry & Peres, 2015; Abrahams et al., 2017), which could compromise the well-being of forest- dependent rural communities (Nasi et al., 2011). Yet forest dwellers circulate between rural and urban spaces, and urban demand for wildmeat creates income opportunities (van Vliet et al., 2015a,b; Chaves et al., 2019).


U Wildmeat and urbanization in Amazonia


Until recently, urban wildmeat consumption in Amazonia was considered negligible (Nasi et al., 2011), reflecting a pau- city of relevant research.However, emerging evidence shows that most households in provincial Amazonian towns con- sume terrestrial and aquatic wild species (excluding fish) at least occasionally (Parry et al., 2014; Morsello et al., 2015), and estimates of overall urban consumption in Amazonia number in the thousands of tonnes annually (van Vliet et al., 2014; El Bizri et al., 2020b; Chaves et al., 2021a,b). Most studies attribute urban wildmeat consumption in


PATRICIA CARIGNANO TORRES ( orcid.org/0000-0003-0426-8277)Graduate


Program in Complex Systems Modelling, School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil


CARLA MORSELLO ( orcid.org/0000-0001-7548-6541) School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil


LUKE PARRY (Corresponding author, orcid.org/0000-0003-0330-9516,


luke.parry@lancaster.ac.uk) Lancaster EnvironmentCentre, LancasterUniversity, Lancaster, LA1 4YQ, UK


Received 25 May 2021. Revision requested 30 July 2021. Accepted 26 October 2021. First published online 5 August 2022.


Amazonia to commercial trade either explicitly (van Vliet et al., 2015a,b; El Bizri et al., 2020b) or implicitly (Chaves et al., 2019). However, there is also evidence of non-market acquisition (wildmeat gifts; Morsello et al., 2015; Carignano Torres et al., 2021) that contributes to maintaining social re- lations and meeting food needs (WinklerPrins & de Souza, 2005; Nunes et al., 2019a).


Rural–urban mobility


Amazonia has undergone rapid but spatially heterogeneous urbanization (Guedes et al., 2009), with consequences for


This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work. Oryx, 2022, 56(6), 864–876 © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605321001575


rbanization can increase natural resource use (Güneralp et al., 2017), contradicting previous assump-


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