How has this forest in Bolivia changed over time? Swipe to travel back to 1986 ➡️ The Tierras Bajas region in Bolivia is home to some of the most distinctive land-use patterns in the world. Since the late 1970s, a series of pinwheel-shaped and rectangular deforestation zones have remade the Chiquitano dry forest landscapes east of Santa Cruz de la Sierra. Radial deforestation patterns first appeared when the U.S. and Bolivian governments worked to resettle impoverished migrants from the Andean highlands (Altiplano) to this lowland area. Years later, foreign and domestic investors moved in and set up large-scale farming operations that cleared broad areas for commodity crops, especially soybeans. Rather than expanding radially from a central point, these newer operations began with the construction of roads running deep into forested areas. Development spread outward in stepwise fashion, leaving rectangular deforestation patterns. #Bolivia #Landsat #EarthFromSpace 📸Photos by Landsat satellites taken in 1986 and 2022 Image description 1: Aerial photo taken of the Tierras Bajas region in Bolivia in 2022. Deforestation patterns appear as green and tan rectangular areas in the top left image and pin-wheel shaped areas toward the bottom right. Image description 2: Aerial photo taken of the Tierras Bajas region in Bolivia in 1986. Dark green dominates the image with light green patches in the top left and a prominent tan line that spans the image from bottom to top.