Pantropical distribution of short-rotation woody plantations: spatial probabilities under current and future climate

Katharina Schulze (), Žiga Malek (), Dmitry Schepaschenko (), Myroslava Lesiv (), Steffen Fritz () and Peter H. Verburg ()
Additional contact information
Katharina Schulze: Institute for Environmental Studies, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Žiga Malek: Institute for Environmental Studies, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Dmitry Schepaschenko: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Myroslava Lesiv: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Steffen Fritz: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Peter H. Verburg: Institute for Environmental Studies, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 2023, vol. 28, issue 5, No 6, 22 pages

Abstract: Abstract Short-rotation woody plantations (SRWPs) play a major role in climate change mitigation and adaptation plans, because of their high yields of woody biomass and fast carbon storage. However, their benefits, trade-offs and growing-success are heavily location-dependent. Therefore, spatial data on the distribution of SRWPs are indispensable for assessing current distribution, trade-offs with other uses and potential contributions to climate mitigation. As current global datasets lack reliable information on SRWPs and full global mapping is difficult, we provide a consistent and systematic approach to estimate the spatial distribution of SRWPs in (sub-)tropical biomes under current and future climate. We combined three advanced methods (maximum entropy, random forest and multinomial regression) to evaluate spatially explicit probabilities of SRWPs. As inputs served a large empirical dataset on SRWP observations and 17 predictor variables, covering biophysical and socio-economic conditions. SRWP probabilities varied strongly between regions, and might not be feasible in major parts of (sub-)tropical biomes, challenging the feasibility of global mitigation plans that over-rely on tree plantations. Due to future climatic changes, SRWP probabilities decreased in many areas, particularly pronounced in higher emission scenarios. This indicates a negative feedback with higher emissions resulting in less mitigation potential. Less suitable land for SRWPs in the future could also result in fewer wood resources from these plantations, enhancing pressure on natural forests and hampering sustainability initiatives that use wood-based alternatives. Our results can help adding a more nuanced treatment of mitigation options and forest management in research on biodiversity and land use change.

Keywords: Tree plantations; Forest management; Land-based climate change mitigation; Spatial probability mapping; Land use modelling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11027-023-10066-5 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:28:y:2023:i:5:d:10.1007_s11027-023-10066-5

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11027

DOI: 10.1007/s11027-023-10066-5

Access Statistics for this article

Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change is currently edited by Robert Dixon

More articles in Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().