Samuel McReynolds                                                    Thomas Johnston                                Charles Geisler
University of New England                                          Freelance Writer                                 Cornell University
 

This article explores aspects of the relationship between agricultural practices, the environment, and land tenure in El Salvador before the implementation of the neoliberal economic reforms in 1989. Its primary objective is to identify and examine critical agricultural practices and conditions in relationship to El Salvador's biophysical environment. In addition, it explores the way social and economic factors, including the neoliberal economic reforms, influence agricultural practices and conditions that exert environmental pressures. The conclusion is reached that a wide range of agricultural practices are having negative and potentially negative impacts on the environment. Land tenure in general, and agrarian reform in particular, played an important role in the adoption of these agricultural practices. In addition, the neoliberal economic reforms have increased the marginalization of agriculture and have thus exacerbated an already negative environmental situation.

Keywords: land tenure, agrarian reform, agricultural practices, biophysical environment, neoliberal economy; El Salvador