Can Community Members Identify Tropical Tree Species for REDD+ Carbon and Biodiversity Measurements?

ABSTRACT: Biodiversity conservation is a required co-benefit of REDD+. Biodiversity monitoring is therefore needed, yet in most areas it will be constrained by limitations in the available human professional and financial resources. REDD+ programs that use forest plots for biomass monitoring may be able to take advantage of the same data for detecting changes in the tree diversity, using the richness and abundance of canopy trees as a proxy for biodiversity. If local community members are already assessing the above-ground biomass in a representative network of forest vegetation plots, it may require minimal further effort to collect data on the diversity of trees. We compare community members and trained scientists' data on tree diversity in permanent vegetation plots in montane forest in Yunnan, C

SUBMITTER: Zhao M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5096847 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature