No abstract

India is a large developing country with more than seventy per cent population earning their livelihood from diverse land use activities. Changing climate is a worry for the nation but the country cannot afford to slow down the developing/developmental activities. Landuse activities in irrigated agro-ecosystems have started shifting from traditional agriculture to smart agriculture to meet the country's food requirements and secure livelihood security. But this shift has been achieved at the cost of natural resources and degradation of environment. Realizing the benefits of climate smart agriculture in the changing scenario, farmers are adapting slowly to it but appropriate details of climate vulnerability and package of climate smart agriculture including tree-crop interaction are very limited for adoption. It is important to assess the strengths and weaknesses of carbon sequestration (CS) projects with respect to their practical potential rather than biophysical potential for registration under clean development mechanism for additional income. There is a need to address the technical, economic, legal and social issues of the adopters because they have to lock their land for long time for CS projects, therefore confidence building measures are essentially required to make them aware/motivate for adoption of trees on their farms for mitigation of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and adaptation against changing climate. However, the potential of agroforestry (AF) systems has not been reflected in registration of CS projects due to lack of best practices in AF, procedures and methodologies for carbon accounting, etc., which requires thorough review to develop appropriate models for payments of environmental benefits. Poplar based AF has been considered here as an example to understand the process of accounting CS and its practical applicability for environmental payments.

No abstract

Leaf area index (LAI) is an important determinant of biomass production and yield of short rotation bio-energy plantation. An accurate measurement of LAI is critical for quantifying light interception and penetration within the canopy, and subsequently understanding its influence on the stand carbon and energy balance. The aim of the current study is validation of the Sunscan Plant Canopy Analyzer which serves as an indirect method for the evaluation of the seasonal patterns of LAI, relation between LAI and above ground woody dry biomass and to determine the specific leaf area in short-rotation poplar hybrid clone J-105 (Populus nigra × P. maximowiczii) in uncoppiced (1st rotation) and coppiced (2nd rotation), respectively. LAI was measured in uncoppiced and coppiced by two different methods using indirect (SunScan Plant Canopy Analyzer) and direct (litterfall collection). Sunscan Plant Canopy Analyzer was compared against litterfall collection (only way to retrieve the actual LAI). Simple regression (R2 = 0.82) model was fitted to validate indirect measurement method and a very good agreement (82%) was observed in LAI values estimated from SunScan Plant Canopy Analyzer and from litterfall collection. Seasonal variability of LAI in a short rotation coppice (SRC) culture of poplar clone J-105 was evaluated over six years period (2008–2013), for uncoppiced (2008 and 2009) and coppiced (2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013) culture. The maximum canopy LAI (LAImax) reached 7.3 (uncoppiced) and 9.5 (coppiced). The linear regression (R2 = 0.93) for average LAI and above ground woody dry biomass was determined, and it was found that LAI acts an indicator of biomass productivity. Specific leaf area (SLA) was estimated in both uncoppiced and coppiced culture of poplar. The maximum SLA was found to be 138.9 cm2g−1 in uncoppiced and 126.9 cm2g−1 in coppiced. To conclude, the evaluated indirect LAI measurement method is portable, reliable and faster than direct LAI measurement in high density poplar short-rotation coppice culture.