Volcanic disasters and agricultural intensification: A case study from the Willaumez Peninsula, Papua New Guinea

Environments characterized by frequent volcanic activity provide an excellent opportunity to observe interactions between human land use and ecosystem succession as they unfold over time. A case study tracing the history of re-colonisation by humans and plants following a series of volcanic disasters during the past 40,000 years in the Willaumez Peninsula, Papua New Guinea investigates the utility of Denevan's models describing variation in the intensity of agricultural practices in wet tropical rainforest environments prior to the introduction of metal tools. The archaeological and environmental data obtained to date show that people may have taken advantage of the effects of volcanic activity to establish relatively permanent gardens and therefore avoid the costs associated with shifting cultivation. Archaeological and plant microfossil data show that humans have been interfering with normal vegetation succession from at least the late Pleistocene when long term base camps were established, that some patches were used intensively from the early Holocene and that groups may have been forced to increase the levels of disturbance after the end of a long period of high magnitude volcanic eruptions.