Soil Carbon Pool and Biodiversity Conservation

Objectives

In the context of a study on the Western Ghats and Sri Lanka Biodiversity Hotspot (WGBH), the present project studies the link between two major global concerns, namely biodiversity conservation and global warming due to greenhouse gas emission in the atmosphere.

Various measures were taken to preserve forests and fauna since long. These measures, generally restrictive land use rules, had certainly an impact on the dynamics of Soil Organic Carbon (SOC). However, the human activities are not prohibited inside the WGBH and this project aims at developing a tool to measure the impact on SOC of the various practices, i.e. for conservation and for other activities.

The case studied here, with its intricacies between land status (i.e. forest managed by the public sector and private lands managed for commercial production), the wide spectrum of natural conditions which are covered within a comparatively limited area, is quite different from those treated elsewhere in the world

Materials and Methods

For a large territory (ca 88,000 km²) corresponding to the central part of the biodiversity hotspot (i.eTamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, parts of Maharashtra & Goa), the SOC stocks are evaluated and mapped for two different dates and the variations induced by land use changes over a period of 20 years, estimated (this will require database building, statistical interpretation and intensive GIS work). The primary sources of data reference are: NBSS & LUP soil maps, IFP forest GIS, IFP and NBSS soil data (particularly SOC data).

During the ongoing second phase, an evaluation of the effects of ecosystem / biodiversity conservation strategies on the SOC stock variations is being carried out in more detail on selected areas within this territory.

Partners

• National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning (Indian Council of Agricultural Researc
• Centre de coopération internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement
• Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique
• University of Paris X (Nanterre)

Funding

Indo-French Centre for the Promotion of Advanced Research (CEFIPRA - IFCPAR) French Institute of Pondicherry

Team

IFP

• Dr. F. Borne, Head of Geomatics and Applied Informatics Laboratory
• Dr. Ramesh, B.R., Head of Botany laboratory
• Muthusankar, G., GIS Engineer

National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning

• Dr. Nair, K.M., Researcher, project leader Indian side
• Dr. Krishnan, P., former project leader Indian side, retired
• Dr. Budihal, S.L., Researcher
• Dr. L.G.K. Naidu, Researcher
• Dr. S.Thayalan, Researcher
• Shri S. Srinivas, Computer specialist

Centre de coopération internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD) - France

• Dr. Bourgeon, G., Research engineer, project leader French side
• Dr. Lo Seen D., GIS/RS Researcher-Engineer

Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA) - France

• Dr. Arrouays, D., Director Infosol, Researcher
• Dr. Martin, M., Research Engineer

University of Paris X (Nanterre) - France

• Dr. Landy, F., Researcher

Main Outputs

Soil Organic Carbon stock maps and land cover maps of study area for 1977 and 1999.

Work in progress in selected focal areas (Napoklu and Makut areas in Kodagu district and South Kabini area in Mysore District)

• KRISHNAN P., BOURGEON G., LO SEEN D., NAIR K.M., PRASANNA R., SRINIVAS S., MUTHUSANKAR G., DUFY L., RAMESH B.R., 2007. Organic carbon stock map for South Indian soils: a multifactorial approach, Current Science.

• MARTIN M.P., LO SEEN D., BOULONNE L., JOLIVET C., NAIR K.M., Bourgeon G., Arrouays D., 2007. Optimizing Pedotransfer Functions for estimating soil bulk density using boosted regression trees, Soil Science Society of America Journal, [in press]