According to Sohngen (2010), forest actions could account for up to 30%% of global mitigation efforts through the implementation of three different policies: afforestation (the conversion of land that had other uses to forests), avoided deforestation, and forest management (renewing forest vegetation or changing the forest type in order to absorb more carbon).
He says the loss of the forest is changing the local climate, causing both droughts and flooding, while cropdusters spraying pesticides have wiped out the village's cotton crops and poisoned its water.
Nevertheless, the resilience of a forest to changing climate should not be only measured by its productivity and biomass, likely species responses and stability of key species in the community should also be considered as indicators of forest response.
For example, citizens from the Pacific Northwest are repeatedly reaching out to me with agonized pleas to help publicize the fact that the Forest Service is on the verge of permitting the Navy to conduct electromagnetic testing on the land and waters surrounding Olympic National Park and Forest, effectively changing the entire character of the area.
Future forest management will be challenged to adjust forests to changing climatic conditions, to prevail sustainable and economic viable timber production, and to maintain and enhance forest biodiversity.
And, Carbon Nation takes viewers through the key solutions sets (types of renewable energy, energy efficiency, land use changes (both in protecting rain forests and changing farming) while providing key information in digestible amounts in ways that people can remember.
Therefore, a critical need exists to improve our understanding of how the growing seasons of forests are changing, and by extension, how the composition and function of forests will respond to future climate change.
Projecting the response of forests to changing climate requires understanding how biotic and abiotic controls on tree growth will change over time.
Next month, we are launching Global Forest Watch, a major new initiative that uses satellite technology, open data, and human networks to show where and how forests are changing.
Human activities are part of ecosystem dynamics, and human perceptions of forests are changing.
