摘要
《京都议定书》意味着新的可能性:人类将把生物圈作为碳库进行管理。无论从环境还是社会经济的观点来看,把农业生态系统作为碳库是最合适可行的。非洲地区退化的生态系统显著受益于土地管理的改善(碳积累计划的一部分)。在非洲有大面积的这样的农业生态系统,对它们的恢复是一个亟待解决的问题。我们同意UNEP的观点:《气候变化公约》、《联合国防治沙漠化公约》以及《联合国生物多样性公约》相互之间将会产生潜在而重要的促进作用。我们调查了苏丹半干旱农业生态系统土壤碳含量增加的潜力,发现延长休耕期将使土壤碳增加,而农业边缘区转变成牧场后碳储量将在100年内恢复到天然萨王纳的80%。碳增汇带来的经济收益将会对这些农业生态系统的家庭经济产生显著的贡献。
The Kyoto Protocol opens new possibilities for using the biosphere as a carbon sink. Using agro-ecosystems as carbon sinks may be the most appropriate practice from both environmental and socioeconomic points of view. Degraded agro-ecosystems in Africa might benefit significantly from the improved land management that would be part of a carbon sequestration program. There are vast areas of these agro-ecosystems in Africa and their rehabilitation is an urgent matter. We agree with UNEP that there are potentially important synergies to be made between the Convention on Climate Change, the UN Convention to Combat Desertification and the UN Convention on Biodiversity. In this paper, we have investigated the potential for increasing soil carbon content in semiarid agro-ecosystems in the Sudan and found that increasing fallow periods will result in increased soil carbon content and converting marginal agricultural areas to rangeland will restore the carbon levels to 80% of the natural savannah carbon levels in 100 years. The economic gain from a future carbon sequestration program has the potential of a significant contribution to the household economy in these agro-ecosystems.Ambio, Vol. 31, No. 6, pp. 471-477, 2002
