Abstract
This article discusses the development of a monitoring system to estimate carbon sequestration in New Zealand's planted Kyoto forests, those forests that have been planted since January 1, 1990, on land that previously did not contain forest. The system must meet the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change good practice guidance and must be seen to be unbiased, transparent, and verifiable. At the same time, the system should meet a wider set of objectives for international forest reporting and forest health. The core of the system is to be a network of some 400 permanent sample points, established objectively on a 4- by 4-km grid coincident with an area of Kyoto forest. Each sample point is a cluster of four 0.04-ha circular plots installed in a design similar to that employed in the United States Forest Inventory and Analysis program. Sufficient data are collected at each point to enable the carbon density in each of the required reporting pools to be calculated or modelled. At a subset of points, integrated with an existing system implemented on an 8-km square grid over New Zealand's indigenous forest and shrubland, assessments of soil carbon and plant biodiversity are made. The intention is that the inventory will have a 3-year measurement cycle, with one-third of the points remeasured each year.
Parent Publication
Citation
Moore, John; Payton, Ian; Burrows, Larry; Goulding, Chris; Beets, Peter; Lane, Paul; Stephens, Peter. 2007. Development of a national forest inventory for carbon accounting purposes in New Zealand''s planted Kyoto forests. In: McRoberts, Ronald E.; Reams, Gregory A.; Van Deusen, Paul C.; McWilliams, William H., eds. Proceedings of the seventh annual forest inventory and analysis symposium; October 3-6, 2005; Portland, ME. Gen. Tech. Rep. WO-77. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service: 31-38.
