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The Amazon basin comprises approximately 56% of the world's tropical rain forests. Brazil contains around 67% of the Amazon rainforest. The forests of the Brazilian Amazon are being cut for cattle ranching, logging, agriculture, and urban development. Deforestation rates in Brazil have averaged approximately 20 x 10³ km² year^-1 over the past two decades. Proposed infrastructure projects include 6245 km of paved roads, which could contribute an additional 120,000-270,000 km² of additional deforestation by doubling the area of forest accessible via paved highways. The ecological and socioeconomic impacts of clear-cutting Amazon forests for cattle pastures have been widely recognized. However, selective logging of forests has now become a dominant land use in the Brazilian Amazon. Estimates of the area logged annually in the Brazilian Legal Amazon approach 15,000 km² similar to the annual area of clear cuts. Because of the emerging dominance of selective logging as a widespread land use and the relatively little data available on the system, we propose to focus our work on the impacts of selective logging on carbon (C) and nutrient stocks and water fluxes. We have identified a new site located in northwestern Mato Grosso (MT). According to recent data from National Institute for Space Research (INPE), MT had the highest mean annual deforestation rate from 1991-1998, yet there is relatively little local information on the impact of forest conversion and logging in MT on biogeochemical processes. The site is also at a frontier currently experiencing active logging and settlement and is the focus of a major development project funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) aimed at improving natural resource management to enhance local livelihoods and conserve native biodiversity. We will collaborate with the Federal University of Mato Grosso (UFMT) and ProNatura (the NGO leading the GEF work) to examine the impact of conventional logging and reduced impact logging on C, nutrient and water fluxes and the effects on local streams. We will also estimate above and belowground forest biomass to develop more efficient allometric equations for lowland tropical forests in Amazonia. This project linking the UFMT, ProNatura and Cornell University's tropical soils and cropping systems program will be headquartered at UFMT in Cuiabá, MT with a research base in the town of Juruena that is adjacent to the proposed site. Professor Johannes Lehmann (PI) of the Department of Crop and Soil Sciences of Cornell University, USA will lead the research team. Two professors from UFMT, Prof. Carlos A.M. Passos (PI, Forestry) and Prof. Eduardo Couto (PI, Soil Science) will provide local management experience. The team will include Professor Susan Riha (Co-PI) of the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences of Cornell University. We will emphasize capacity building at the local level and have made provisions for training and research opportunities for the faculty and students at the UFMT.

LBA-ECO Project Phase II

Carbon and Nutrient Stocks and Regrowth in Reduced Impact and Conventionally Logged Forests and Settlements in NW Mato Grosso, Brazil.

- Cornell University

- Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso

- Pro-Natura

- Rohden Indústria Lígnea Ltda.

1. Measurement of existing forest biomass (carbon) and nutrient stocks and validation of available models for estimating forest biomass.

2. Quantification of the impact of soil texture and fertility gradients on above and belowground C and nutrient stocks in local forests.

3. Measurement of the impact of conventional (CL) versus reduced impact logging (RIL) on C dynamics and the composition and quantity of nutrients, water and organic matter entering and being processed within streams.

25,000 ha primary forest block (Rohden Forest) south of the town of Juruena in north-western Mato Grosso, Brazil (PDF)

 

 

WE THANK

All participants of ND-11 Team of LBA-ECO project express our sincere gratitude to Mr. Apolinário Stuhler representing Rohden Indústria Lígnea Ltda. for his understanding to the importance of our research and hospitality for instalation of our experiments.