THEGlJARDlAN,SundaY.Augusr28,2011
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added. It indicilled thai tI,e situation may worsen with lime, oburvingthilt, on one tJltreme, "expected incre.. se~ In Ihe frequency. seventy of droughfand heal st r~s.s ;associated with climate change can fund;ament;ally;alter the compositlon;and StructUff: a fforests.." More-over, "increases In tree mon;ality;are of partlcul;ar concern btuust decaying uees also releilse l;ar~t amounts of carbon Into lhe atmosphere. On the other extreme, however, "d«reased rai nfall and more s~vere druughu, such as thaI prestnlly beln] tJlpr rlenced In the Horn of Africa, arc elipeCled 10 be p.:artlcularly slressflll for Afrlcar. populations Ihal depend on forests (or food, cl~an water and other basic needs'II alluded to examples oCablotic dis tu rba nces and thclr lmparu on forests.llS In· cludlng::a. maJor storm In Swedl!'n In 2005, which uprooted or damaged trees In over 1.2 million hectil ru of for~t:Troplcill Cyclone Sidr. which hit Bangladesh In 1007and ilC(ec[cod almost nlnt million people and dOlm· agw nea rl y 1.5 mill ion houses and some four million trees; ilnd Ihe lOIO ea rthquake and subsequent tsu nami In cen n a] Chile, which killed more Ihan 700 pt:oplt> and caused up 10 S30 billion In economic 10ssl!S to Illecoun·
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011
Extreme Weather Threatens Forest, FoodSecuri~Economy
By-N
ATURAL disaSters and extreme weatherevenu are prominent among whal ellperu sald will pose an Increasing threat to Ihe world's roresrs in coming years, requiring heightened cooperation between regions and countries, an International partnership for forest conurvation and Improvemerl,l has wam«l. The report has also nngered man-m a.de dlsaslers such a.s oil spill as a cause for concern, considering irs impa.c! on ra restsa.nd food security. The Collaboratlvt Partnership on Forests (CPF), comprising 1-1 inltrnatlo nal organisations ilnd secreta.riars,ln ill new report from FAO, lssu~ thIs warnIng. According 10 the report, fltled -Abiotic disturbances and their Influence on for· est heal[h; almost 01 ,000 elllreme events - so-ca lled 'abiotic disturban[I!S' such as cyclones, floods, landslides, tornadoes, earth9.,uakes, volcanic I!'ruptlons and "mega forl'st fires - occurred between 1000 and 2009 worldwide. And recently they have also included ma.n·made events such a.s radiOlictive contillmlnation and oil spills. nll~ CPF call«l upon forest tn,;Inagt:rs to apply forest poliCies such itS dlvtfs lfying sp«ies, usi ng windbreaks and milled cropping patterns to protl!'ct foruts from disasters, minimising Ihe risks and Impacts of extreme evenu. The condition of forests themselves, lhe report Indicated, can havl!'an influence- on the extreme events. Forexample, defortsta· tion or poor management ca.n incre.llSe noodlngand landslides during cyclones. Degradation of ma. ngrove forests may Increase th t: damage caused by storms or u un;amfs. "Obse£vatlans (rom the MaJdlves,* ac-
cording to th~ r~port, "s how~d thilt coaslill fonesls ilr~ moSt res ill~ntl O tsunilml ImpilCU wh~ n Idtas iln undisturbed, mixedspecies com munity. Silnd dunes, milngrov~ foresu and cor;a) r~~fs;a ll help to reduce the energy of tsunami waves as well as retiJln soil and preserve ufe conditions to allow biodiversity to thrive. Although mature mangroves are qulle reSistant to water surges, then are limits to dds resillence'"Dlsturb;ances are expectw to continue 10 Incrust In Inte nslly,quanrlty;and freo-
quency; sa id Eduardo Rojas·Bnales, FAO's Asslnant Dlrl'Ctor..(;eneral far Forestryilnd CPFcllalr. "In2004, when Ihe Indian Ocean Tsunami hlr Indonesla,lt eluted nearly 49000 hectares of coasta) forest's fexdudIng mimgroves) and significantlyclamaged nearly )00-750 hecrares of ma.ngrovt: forests, representing economic losses of Sl l.9 million and S25 million, respectively. BUI with improved coastal and mangrove forests management the-se Iyeu of dfl'CU can besubsra.ml" lly rwuced, the repon
l'htre were concerns aboul "ClimillM hange adaplillionplanning" as M ing "hamperw by iI lade of infonnalion about ( urrtnl and futurl!' climate'-relalw impacts." Said SteV(' Makungwa from the Forestry Resea rch Net· work for Sub-Sahafln Mrica (FORNESSA), a n imtlalh'l!' thai hilS wor ked \~ilh rhe' imernallonal Union of Forest Research Organiza· tions( IUFRO)on cl lmale changt' impacts on Africa n forests, "lhere Is a need for reliabte r~ glonal projections ,IS well as ea rlywamlng systems lhal require' investm ents In research and monitoring inrrastructure." The rtpo rt Idc-nll lled ".lClapt lve (OTI!'Sl manilgemenlinvolvlngall sC"ctorsand stakehold· ers" as "usenllallo protect the' world's Corest resou rce's.. And si nce such dlSlurban c~ do nOI respect borders, regional or interna· tlonal coo pC'~tlon is badly ff:Cl"ulred." Mt'ol nwhlle, "ITIO-funded prOIKts 10 re ha· bllltol[C'lSunilml-dilma.gw mangrove'S In the Ayeya rwadydelta of Myan mar, In PhangNga and Ranong Provi nces, southern Thaila nd, ilnd In manYOlhercoumrle'S are helping 10 ensure that rUl'Ure extrl!'me weather or I'sunaml evenl:S will be less damaging to local com munllies Ihan the Iragic200-l lndlan Ocea n el'ent; accord ing to Emmanuel Ze Meka, Ex«utlve Director of the International Tropical TimbC'rOrganiSCIlion (mO), I t woils disdosed tha t,ln NovemberlOl1,lhe Inlr-rgovemmental Panel on OlmateChange (Irce) will rdease a spedal report on manag· Ing the risks 01ellfreme I!'vents and disasters to adl'ance climate (hange adapliJtion. The report "ai ms to become a resource (ar ded· sian-makers to more effectively manage the risks or theu events'In advance of Ihe report, CPF partners,lt was gatherd, have ca.lled upon fores t man.agers to d!'velop Strategies 10 adapt 10 (urnre drought events redUCing tree de nllry to ease compell. tlon, selecting planu with Improv«l droughl reslslance, ana shi fting Crom monoculture plantations to species· rich fo rests.