We now have over two months of perspective after the closing of the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP) of

the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); was it the disappointment that most had expected, or did it actually make some unexpected progress?

Unfortunately, seventeen annual Conferences of the Parties have failed in meeting the clear goal set forth in the 1992 UNFCCC treaty. Greenhouse gas emissions are continuing to increase on a trajectory that is leading to the upper end of warming projections, and the record of extreme weather events is accumulating, along with disastrous economic, human health, and environmental impacts that accompany them. The recent Durban meeting made a procedural breakthrough of sorts by getting both developed and developing countries to negotiate a single emissions agreement that will apply to all signatory countries starting in 2020. It is tempting to conclude that this progress is simply too little too late, but in the meantime, various national and subnational projects are moving forward that are helping define what might work in the global arena.

We at WHRC and our Green Belt Movement partners made our own breakthrough at a Durban side event, by merging the narratives of people who live close to their forests with the scientific and economic analyses that quantify the importance of forests for policy makers. We all view the world

February 2012In the Field

through the lenses of our own personal experiences, and that couldn’t have been truer of the side event panelists. Mercy Karunditu, Senior Project Officer of the Green Belt Movement, spoke compellingly of how tree planting has allowed the village women of Kenya to earn money and to shorten the distances they walk in search of water and wood for cooking. However, climate extremes, such as floods and droughts, can imperil this progress, as described by Constance Okollet, Chairperson of Osukuru United Women’s Network, who spoke of her village in Uganda that has not yet recovered from a giant flood in 2007.

Next up were WHRC scientists, Glenn Bush and Nadine Laporte. Glenn spoke of the ways in which economists try to measure how people value forests, putting into numbers the values that Constance and Mercy had expressed with their narratives. Nadine provided yet another perspective as a scientist who spends hours “seeing” forests through the images taken by satellites orbiting the earth, while also emphasizing the importance of capacity building.

All of these lenses through which we view forests converge on the crucial importance of forests. I don’t know how long it will take for the insights gleaned by merging views through such different lenses to carry the day at the negotiating tables, but I am convinced that the views of people who need forests and the views of sound science will ultimately prevail.

Durban in Retrospect A letter from the director ...

Pantropical Scholars Quarterly NewsletterWoods HoleResearch Center

In this Issue:

Eric Davidson, PhD

Reports from Bolivia, Colombia, Gabon, Indonesia,

Mexico, Uganda, Laos and Zambia!

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Scholar’s Editorial from Gabon Andréana Paola Mekui Biyogo, PhD

Dear Scholars,

It is so valuable to know each other’s activities and especially to understand what our evolution is in the fight against deforestation and forest degradation in our respective countries and in accordance with the training we have received at WHRC. As citizens of tropical countries we contribute to the slowing down of forest loss for three forest basins – the Amazon, Congo and South-East Asia.

But what is our status in our individual countries? Is our expertise recognized there? In other words, how can we measure the impact of the scholar program on our own countries? While some of us have decision-making ability and autonomy in our work, it is not the case for others. For all of us, this newsletter can serve as a platform to speak about and be heard on all the challenges we face in our work.

In this second edition, the activities undertaken by the scholars focused on the themes of CDM, REDD, sustainable development, and climate change. While some of us are developing indicators of biodiversity (Mexico), others are concentrating on field data collection protocols (Zambia), performing sensitivity analyses for an oil-rich forest reserve (Uganda), analyzing satellite data to produce maps of deforestation (Bolivia), participating in workshops and contributing knowledge and expertise to national conversations regarding deforestation (Gabon), completing REDD feasibility studies (Laos), or developing MRV methodologies on carbon (Indonesia). It is inspiring to see how, in our own individual ways, we are all working toward a common goal!

Paolo

Project Coordinator Update Tina Cormier, MS

Winter has finally arrived on Cape Cod! After some mild temperatures, we seem to be experiencing a bit more typical weather here now. For many of us this time after the holidays is a great opportunity

to spend quality hours getting work done at the office. Our travel schedules are less hectic, and everyone seems to be hunkered down at their desks, toiling away on research, reports, and proposals.

I am no exception! I have been working on several projects focused on the tropics and also in the U.S. I am using field-collected reference data and radar, and optical satellite images to classify floodplain land cover in the Varzea region of Brazil as well as along the Napo River on the Peru/Ecuador border. One of the image stacks has 29 layers, with Landsat data reaching way back to the 1980s and ALOS data from as recently as early 2011. It’s quite an impressive catalog of information, and we are excited to be mining it!

We are using the same segmentation–random forest approach that we have discussed in our workshops to classify the images. Additionally, I have been helping Drs. Kellndorfer and Walker with a book chapter detailing a radar-based land cover change analysis on a section of the Xingu River watershed in Mato Grosso, Brazil.

Dr. Kellndorfer and I are also working on a different type of radar project. We are trying to map soil moisture at two sites in the U.S. using ALOS. We have field sites in Maine (forested) and North Dakota (agricultural) where we collect soil moisture information every 30 minutes during the growing season, and we are trying to find a relationship between soil moisture and radar backscatter that would allow us to generate maps of soil moisture in similar areas. Based on preliminary results, we will attempt to use modeling to remove the vegetation response from the radar backscatter to get a clearer picture of how soil moisture is affecting the signal. We are also investigating the use of C-Band radar (ENVISAT, RADARSAT). These projects have kept me very busy over the past couple of months! Tina

Part of our effort on the management side has been

focused on getting our beloved scholars back to Woods Hole for the 4th annual 2-week festival of technology and experience sharing, commonly known as the Visiting Scholars capacity building workshop. Each year has been better than the previous, and we’d love to keep up the energy and get the greatest possible benefit from our shared experience working with satellite imagery and GIS for forest conservation and management.

Conducting the annual workshop requires money, and we are in the process of “rescoping” our pantropical mapping activity to spend remaining funds and position ourselves to continue our mapping and capacity building work in the most productive way for everyone here at WHRC and with all of the scholars.

Unfortunately, we were not able to do a simple “no cost extension” to spend the remaining money, but instead have been involved in preparing not one, but three separate rescoping proposals, each with a separate budget and emphasis area. Further, we were disappointed to learn that the research side cannot include Africa, owing to the funders’ own preferences, and so we will no longer have a truly “pan tropical” mapping effort.

Fortunately, the capacity building that we know is so vital to our overall effort will continue to include colleagues from Africa; that was a priority for us. Going forward we may have to change the overall name of the effort from pantropical mapping to pantropical capacity building, but whatever we call it we are working to continue our vital collaboration. Nadine has also been working on a new proposal with the East African scholars to secure funding through the NASA applied Sciences Program.

Deputy Director Report Scott Goetz, PhD

Woods Hole

Thoughts from the Carbon Scientist Alessandro Baccini, PhD

This is a great time for the pantropical team, and not

only because winter arrived and disappeared in just a few days, but because our pantropical mapping project was published on January 29. For many of you, the work is not new. It was presented during the scholar program and you are probably already running your new and improved script. That said, I would like to think that you will appreciate seeing the work published in a peer-reviewed journal. The article can be accessed via this link. I am now working on quantifying uncertainties associated with the biomass mapping process. We used a multi-staged approach that integrates field measurements with LiDAR and MODIS data, it was important to propagate the errors relative to each step to the final biomass estimate reported on the map. This has kept me busy working with Luis Carvalha, a professor of statistics at Boston University, who helped me design a solid statistical approach for generating uncertainties in maps. We were able to reduce the processing time from months to a few days! The results are very encouraging, and I hope to share them with you soon.

Deforestation Monitoring in Bolivia Eric Armijo

The past two months have been devoted to the

preparation of a 2008-2010 deforestation map for the Bolivian “Legal Amazon.” This area of 16 million hectares in the northern part of the country is still mostly covered by dense humid forest. However a recent increase in logging, small scale agriculture and conversion to pasture suggests a major threat to the forest.

The Friends of Nature Foundation (FAN-Bolivia) has identified the Northern portion of the country as a key area to promote the sustainable use of the forest, including non-timber products. This strategy is aimed at reducing deforestation and forest degradation, which could guarantee the integrity of current Amazon ecosystems.

The regional monitoring of the forest area, achieved through a combination of remote sensing and field work, will provide a way to locate and quantify deforestation through time. The resulting products (maps and reports) will support better actions by FAN and other stakeholders.

Our team at IDEAM (the Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology, and Environmental Studies of Colombia) recently finished

the first phase of the project entitled “Technical and scientific institutional capacity to support REDD projects for reducing emissions from deforestation in Colombia,” which was funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. We have begun to plan the second phase of the project in order to continue monitoring deforestation and carbon stocks in natural forests. The work we did with Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC) strengthened the capacity of Colombia for the processing of digital images (Optical and Radar).

The participation of IDEAM researchers in the annual training programs organized by WHRC positively influenced some of the final products generated by the project, such as the Protocol of Digital Processing of Images for the Quantification of Deforestation in Colombia at the National and Sub-national levels, the estimation of national deforestation, and the estimation of carbon stocks. A Spanish summary of the products generated in the project can be viewed via this embedded link:

In this first phase, it was possible to establish a historic baseline of the deforestation in Colombia by updating the deforestation rate for 3 periods 1990-2000, 2000-2005 and 2005-2010. For example, we were able to identify that for the most recent period, the annual rate was 238.361 hectares/year. Related information and the results of carbon estimates can be found in the following links: Publication 1. Publication 2.

Additionally, the project delivers a web application in which all information generated in this phase can be viewed. The following link will lead to the application: Spanish version.

It is important for IDEAM to continue and expand our work with WHRC, as the exchange of knowledge during WHRC workshops and subsequent trainings led by IDEAM allow us to improve our capacity to apply methodologies that generate the high quality geographic products needed to monitor our natural forests.

Phase One of Colombia REDD Technical Capacity Study Complete

Edersson Cabrera, Diana Vargas & Paola Giraldo

Bolivia

Field validation required crossing large rivers and driving many hours.

Right above: Cattle ranching is a major driver of deforestation in the Bolivian Amazon. Right below: Riverine vegetation bordering the Beni river, near the city of Riberalta.

Colombia

2005 - 2010 Colombia Landsat.

Developing a National Strategy for Sustainable Development in Gabon Andréana Paola Mekui Biyogo

In the last quarter of 2011, I participated in a number of workshops; contributed to the development of a number of

policy documents and annual work plan in my institution, the Ministry of Water and Forest, Gabon. Indeed, as Focal Point of the National Commission for Sustainable Development (CNDD) to represent my institution in the inter-ministerial committee, the majority of my time was spent developing the National Strategy on Sustainable Development (NSSD). I mention only the workshops related to the fight against climate change that I have been involved with over the last 3 months:

• Workshop on assessment and evaluation of forest carbon in Gabon, organized by the National Agency of National Parks and AGEOS. I represented my institution as a remote sensing expert. My role was to provide technical advice on methods of carbon stock assessment by remote sensing, and on the establishment of a standard field inventory protocol for permanent plots set up to monitor carbon.

• Workshop on the report of the Second National Communication on Climate Change, Gabon, which was submitted to the UNFCCC Secretariat at the COP17 in Durban in December 2011.

• Workshop on developing the national strategy document on CDM. As a member of the multidisciplinary working group implemented by the National Authority for CDM, I contributed to the preparation of CDM projects for my institution.

• Workshop to launch the National Strategy for Sustainable Development (NSSD), whose main objective was to review and amend the priorities of that NSSD for Gabon, covering four major challenges, namely to promote good governance, ensure economic growth prosperity, improve and expand social welfare, and protect the environment.

The links below lead to press coverage of our work:

Publication 1 / Publication 2 / Publication 3 / Publication 4

A workshop in progress.

Gabon

I am just back from the field in the Katingan District of Central Kalimantan Province. The Ministry of Forestry (MOF), Republic of Indonesia, in collaboration with ITTO and Marubeni Corp has signed an MoU to conduct a full Feasibility

Study (FS) to develop a complete REDD+ MRV Methodology for the bilateral offset scheme.

One of the activities carried out by the MOF is to undertake, design, and test the applicability and scientific thoroughness of the carbon MRV methodology through the measurement and monitoring of peat, water level, and forest biomass at each permanent sampling plot. This work is jointly implemented by PT Starling Resources and University of Hokkaido with the following activities:

• ForestBiomass(AboveGroundCarbonstock)measurement: Analyze above ground biomass using remote sensing technologies (e.g., ALOS AVNIR, Landsat) and field measurements, determine and establish Permanent Sampling Plots (PSPs), develop allometric equation for peat forest.

• Peatanalysis: Analyze peat depth data from past survey, determine and establish PSPs, analyze carbon content of peat samples

• Waterlevel: Set up data loggers at water level sampling plots, measure and test peat depth in selected PSPs, analyze water level data at selected PSPs.

Development and Testing of a Carbon MRV Methodology and Monitoring Plan in Indonesia Virni Budi Arifanti

Below left: Diameter and tree height measurement. Below center: The entire team gathers for a photo. Bottom right: Taking plot coordinates and measuring tree density in ex- burnt peat forest.

Indonesia

Decisions Support System (SSD), CONABIO, Mexico Isabel Trejo

With my colleagues in the National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity (CONABIO), we have been

working on assessing the relationship between high biodiversity and high carbon storage in Mexico, and how increasing storage along a gradient of land-use intensity could help mitigate the impact of climate change on forest ecosystems. Reforestation or conservation projects funded under REDD could possibly produce an increase in species richness and biodiversity, and therefore also the capacity to mitigate climate change.

Using information from the National Forest Inventory (INF) and the National Forestry Commission (CONAFOR), we developed an index of environmental or anthropogenic impact. This index is helping to identify and characterize which temperate and tropical forests are the most endangered and which are still undisturbed. (Map 1)

We are also working on assessing changes in taxonomic diversity of trees and change in vegetation structure to further develop an ecological integrity index.

Mexico

Map 1. Tree density map with anthropogenic impacts, per INF. The Yucatan Peninsula shows one of the highest tree densities while Mexico City and surrounding areas have very low tree density.

I have been involved with a lot of satellite image analysis, vector data analysis and fieldwork since my visit to WHRC. I am proud

to report that skills acquired from the WHRC pantropical program came in handy as I worked through this congested schedule. For example, I used Spring 5.1.6 for all image segmentation, ArcGIS 10 to process the vector data, and GPicSync for georeferencing field photos and uploading them to Google Earth. The skills I learned were not limited to remote sensing/GIS, but also included personal and team building skills – gained from Alan and Ned, which helped me effectively coordinate tasks with both management in office and teams in the field. Indeed the team building skills are useful in situations where we are working on projects with overlapping time lines, limited resources, tight deadlines and high expectations from policymakers.

l was responsible for the production of forest maps and other information from Landsat satellite images for the Maramagambo forest reserve. We used this information and maps to create sampling designs for tree species distribution and biodiversity surveys which targeted birds and mammals. Maramagambo forest reserve is one of the largest, least surveyed forest blocks in Uganda. It is part of a complex forest ecosystem that lies in an ecologically sensitive area better known as the Albertine Graben, which is very rich in biodiversity. This is located in southwestern Uganda and is part of other protected areas, the most conspicuous being Queen Elizabeth National Park. Oil exploration started in the area a few years ago and eventually large deposits were discovered. The sensitivity atlas can be downloaded here:

Remote Sensing Technology for Conservation Monitoring in Uganda

Edward Senyonjo

Above: 2010 Environmental Sensitivity Atlas. Below left: A herd of cattle graze and water at the Semliki River. The degraded banks are widening at 10m/yr due to the receding snow on the Rwenzori Mountains. Below right: Butiaba Wanseko Rift Valley

Uganda

The end of 2011 saw The Wildlife Conservation Society complete a REDD feasibility study for the Nam Et Phou Louey National Protected Area (NEPL NPA) in Laos. To do this, land cover change maps (Figure 1) for four years (2000, 2004,

2006 and 2010) as well as a current land cover map of the NPA (Figure 2) were produced using Landsat imagery. These maps allowed us to understand what the current carbon stocks were, on site, and to calculate rates of deforestation. Despite knowing that agricultural practices in the NEPL NPA are intensifying and expanding, our analysis demonstrated that historical rates of deforestation in the NPA have traditionally been low. This is because the expansion is occurring in existing fallow areas rather than at the expense of forest. This means however, that the project has a low emission reduction potential, based upon current methodologies accepted by the Verified Carbon Standard, and is unlikely to generate a high number of carbon credits.

The outcome is that WCS is now looking into alternative approaches to develop the NEPL NPA as a REDD project. In particular, WCS is exploring the possibility of developing a sub-national, jurisdictionally based REDD project into which the NEPL NPA would ‘nest.’ Jurisdictional-based REDD is the direction REDD is taking under the UNFCCC. By supporting the development of REDD in NEPL NPA along these lines, WCS hopes to be at the cutting edge of REDD developments.

REDD Feasibility Study for the NEPL NPA in Laos Akchousanh Rasphone & Colin Moore

Figure 1: Map of cumulative deforestation in the NEPL NPA, 2000 – 2010. Figure 2: Land cover map of NEPL NPA in 2010 .

Laos

The ILUA II and UN-REDD Programs in ZambiaTraining of Field Team Leaders (FTL) – Forest Inventory, Soil Surveying and Socio-economic Surveys

Abel M. Siampale & Sitwala Wamunyima

The forestry Department in Zambia, through the Integrated Land-use Assessment (ILUA II) and the UN-REDD programs,

has embarked on training of Field Team Leaders (FTL) that will spearhead the first phase of field data collection scheduled to start in April 2012. Three National Consultants (Forestry Information Specialist, Soil Scientist and Socio-economic Expert) have been engaged to develop field manuals that will contain elaborate methods and protocols for field data collection. These consultants are working closely with us and the project staff (Abel and Sitwala)

and the MRV Expert (Julian Fox) to ensure there is consideration for quality control on the “thematic variables” for the type of data to be collected. Additionally, our main role is to provide technical guidance and expertise on the use of remote sensing to supplement the preferred methods by the experts. The training was preceded with a comprehensive assessment of forestry information needs including REDD+ requirements at national, provincial, and district levels. Below is a tentative tabulation of areas of concentration for biophysical information needs:

AUTHORS’ NOTE: The overall technical guidance and expertise provided by the project staff (Abel and Sitwala) for ILUA and UN-REDD projects in Zambia, is as a result of the enhanced skills and hands-on knowledge learnt from the 3 year-long (2009, 2010 and 2011) scholar program on Pan‐Tropical Mapping of Forest‐Cover and Above‐Ground Carbon Stock hosted by Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC), particularly in the calibration of field inventory data to remote sensing datasets and mapping of land cover change. The scholars are anticipating that subsequent opportunities to participate in the 2012 scholar program will further enhance their skills in 3 main areas of interest: (i) Image segmentation and % tree cover mapping; (ii) Creation of emission maps; and (iii) Modeling land use and land cover Change. We look forward to coming back! - By Abel & Sitwala

Main Category Sub Detail Variables

Tree Biomass Above ground Tree heights (m), Bole heights (m), Stem diameter (cm) and Crown dimension (count) Below ground Ratio of Below/above ground biomass fraction = 0.28 for tropical dry forest with above ground biomass > 20 tonnes/ha. carbon fraction of biomass equal to 0.47

Dead Organic Matter Dead wood Volume (m3) - Bole heights (m), Stem diameter (cm) Litter/Leaves/Twigs Mass (g) – Collected and weighed in 1g plastic containers Grass Volume (m3) - grass fuel loads

Soil Humus Soil Profile Bulky density, Soil type, Soil Texture, Soil Ph extracted from 1 x 1m dip pits Lab testing Carbon content (tons)

Zambia

Sitwala Wamunyima Abel Siampale

Ourvision is a world in which the insights of science guide management of the Earth’s natural resources, so that we and future generations may sustain prosperous and fulfilling lives without degrading the ecosystems that support humanity and a diverse abundance of life.

The Pantropical Scholar Team

Program Director: Nadine Laporte, PhD Editor & Program Coordinator: Tina Cormier, MS

Design: Ian Vorster, MS, Associate Director of Communications.

www.whrc.org

TheWoods Hole Research Center (WHRC) is a private, non-profit research organization focussing on environmental sciences. Our scientists combine analysis of satellite images of the Earth with field studies to measure, model, and map changes in the world’s ecosystems, from the thawing permafrost in the Arctic to the expanding agriculture regions of the tropics. We work locally and regionally, with in-depth expertise and collaborations in North and South America and Africa; and we also work globally, focussing on how humans are changing global cycles of carbon, nitrogen, and water. We merge natural science with economics to discover sustainable paths for human prosperity and stewardship of the Earth’s natural resources.

Ourmission is to advance scientific discovery and seek science-based solutions for the world’s environmental and economic challenges through research and education on forests, soils, air, and water.