Effects of Land-use changes and forest/soil degradation on C-sequestration

Kjersti Bakkebø

Changes in management practices on agriculture and reforestation programs have great potential to reduce the concentration of atmospheric CO2, thereby helping reduce the problem of global warming.

Forestry and soil management can, therefore, be used as the means of offsetting CO2 emissions caused by anthropogenic activities in a cost effective way.

This study takes Mardi watershed of Nepal as study unit, which is a representative of diverse ecological and bio-physical setting. This region (Hind Kush Himalayn region) provides a life support base for about 400 million people and is suffering from serious problems of forest and soil degradation (ICIMOD, 2000).

Objectives
The general objective of this study is to analyse the underlying causes of land use changes, forests/soil degradation and agricultural practices and their impacts on carbon sequestration at the watershed level in Nepal.
The specific objectives are to:

1.give an overview of the documented knowledge on changes in land use, forestry and agricultural practices related to carbon sequestration processes in the Himalayan region in general and Nepal in particular;
2.analyse the causes of land use changes at watershed level in Nepal,
3.develop and run a dynamic bio-economic model for analysing the effects of changes in land use and agricultural practices on carbon sequestration at the watershed level and the uncertainty related to measuring the carbon sequestration impacts, and
4.analyse the distributional impacts of alternative land use policies for increasing the carbon sequestration, and their chances of success.

Goal
Carbon-sequestration analysis using dynamic bio-economic modelling.

The project was finished in 2006.

Project coordinator
Professor Birger Solberg, INA

PhD student
Thakur Prasad Upadhyay, INA

Project collaboration
Dept. of Plant and Environmental Sciences (IPM/UMB)

Financed by
Research Council of Norway

Publications

-	Upadhyay, T.P., Sankhayan, P.L. & Solberg, B. 2005. A review of carbon sequestration dynamics in the Himalayan region as a function of land-use change and forest/soil degradation with special reference to Nepal. - Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 105: 448-465.
-	Upadhyay, T.P., Solberg, B. & Sankhayan, P.L. 2006. Use of models to analyse land-use changes, forest/soil degradation and carbon sequestration with special reference to Himalayan region: A review and analysis. - Forest Policy and Economics 9: 349-371.

Published: 01.04.05
Updated: 06.10.09
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