“Three Decades of Land Cover Change in the Caucasus Mountains,” a lecture by Johanna Buchner

About the Lecture: The Caucasus, a mountainous region encompassing Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and parts of southern Russia, has undergone profound political and social change since the collapse of the Soviet Union, including four armed conflicts. This talk examines how three decades of land-cover change, political upheaval, and conservation interventions have reshaped the region’s landscapes. Using remote sensing and spatial analysis, Buchner explores how armed conflict influenced patterns of agricultural abandonment and how protected areas affected forest loss and degradation in the Caucasus, a global biodiversity hotspot.

About the Speaker: Dr. Johanna Buchner is a Research Associate in the SILVIS Lab at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, focusing on broad land-cover change and conservation. She previously conducted research on land-cover change in the Caucasus Mountains, and how armed conflicts and protected areas affect the landscape. In addition, she worked for local and state government agencies in Germany, applying spatial analysis and remote sensing to conservation planning. She is dedicated to connecting scientific research to practical land-use management. She earned her PhD in 2020 from the Department of Forestry at UW–Madison. Her selected publications include:

Buchner, J., K. E. Lewińska, V. Butsic, Z. Buřivalová, A. Ghoddousi, N. Rogova, A. Rizayeva, E. V. Bragina, and V. C. Radeloff. 2026. Assessing the effectiveness of strictly protected areas in preventing forest loss and degradation across different forest types in the Caucasus. Biological Conservation, 315: 111685.

Buchner, J., V. Butsic, H. Yin, T. Kuemmerle, M. Baumann, N. Zazanashvili, J. Stapp, V. C. Radeloff (2022): Localized versus wide-ranging effects of the post-Soviet wars in the Caucasus on agricultural abandonment. Global Environmental Change. 76:102580.

Buchner, J., H. Yin, D. Frantz, T. Kuemmerle, E. Askerov, T. Bakuradze, B. Bleyhl, N. Elizbarashvili, A. Komarova, K. E. Lewińska, A. Rizayeva, H. Sayadyan, B. Tan, G. Tepanosyan, N. Zazanashvili, V. C. Radeloff (2020): Land-cover change in the Caucasus Mountains since 1987 based on the topographic correction of multi-temporal Landsat composites. Remote Sensing of Environment. 248:111967.

Yin, H., V. Butsic, V., J. Buchner, T. Kuemmerle, A. V. Prishchepov, M. Baumann, E. V. Bragina, H. Sayadyan, V. C. Radeloff, V. C. (2019): Agricultural abandonment and re-cultivation during and after the Chechen Wars in the northern Caucasus. Global Environmental Change, 55: 149-159.