Alternatives to slash-and burn: above ground biodiversity assessment working group summary report 1996-1999 - impact of different land uses on biodiversity, annex i-v

This report covers the contractual requirement of ASB to the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to meet Goal 2 “Assessment of the impact on biodiversiry of d4fferenr land uses” as outlined in the aims and objectives of Phase 112. It also meets the broader goals of the ASB consortium to explore the dynamic linkages among biodiversity, carbon sequestration and productivity for human needs. The approach has been to establish a series of ecoregional biophysicai baselines to first identify and then to evaluate, via intensive field studies, some of the key predictive relationships among plant and animal species and functional types and the physical environment. The size of this task required that it be tackled at two levels: first, to identify broad distributional patterns of key plant groups along gradients of land use at the ecoregiona] scale, as these are usually closely associated with both plant and animal performance overall; and second, to explore finer scale patterns of both plant and animal performance along an intensive land-use gradient within a specified ecoregion. The assumption has been that the information derived from the intensive study could reveal indicators of biodiversity response to land use that could be extrapolated and subsequently tested within the broader spatial ecoregional framework. Once identified, such indicators would be examined to assess their potential use by managers and planners in ongoing assessment and monitoring of biodiversity and as an aid to decision support for adaptive management. While this report deals mainly with above-ground biodiversity according to the TOR of the GEF contract, close attention has been given as well to below-ground elements in the intensive study in order to better understand the dynamic between biodiversity and land use. Funding for additional survey work in Cameroon and Indonesia was supplied by DANIDA and more recent, ongoing work exploring linkages between biodiversity and profitability in Thailand and Indonesia has been funded by ACIAR.

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