In a recent paper in Global Change Biology Bradshaw and colleagues analyse country statistics on flood characteristics land cover and land cover change and conclude that deforestation amplifies flood risk and severity in the developing world. The study addresses an important and long-standing question but we identify important flaws. Principal among these are difficulties in interpreting country statistics and the correlation between population and floods. We review current knowledge which suggests that the removal of trees does not affect flood events although associated landscape changes can under some circumstances. Reanalysis of the data analysed by Bradshaw and colleagues suggests that population density explains the variation in flood occurrences better than deforestation and feasible explanations are for such a statistical finding are not difficult to conceive. We therefore consider the conclusion of Bradshaw and colleagues to be unsupported. Their paper is a valuable first step to show how these or similar flood data might be used to further explore the relationship between land cover and flooding however.
Publication year
2008
Authors
Dijk, A.I.van.; Calder, I.R.; Bruijnzeel, S.L.A.; Schellekens, J.; Chappell, N.A.; Smyle, J.; Aylward, B.; Van, Noordwijk.M.
Keywords
Data analysis, Deforestation, Disasters, Floods (rising water), Forests, Land cover
