Effects of national ecological restoration projects on carbon sequestration in China from 2001 to 2010

Abstract

The long-term stressful utilization of forests and grasslands has led to ecosystem degradation and C loss. Since the late 1970s China has launched six key national ecological restoration projects to protect its environment and restore degraded ecosystems. Here, we conducted a large-scale field investigation and a literature survey of biomass and soil C in China's forest, shrubland, and grassland ecosystems across the regions where the six projects were implemented (∼16% of the country's land area). We investigated the changes in the C stocks of these ecosystems to evaluate the contributions of the projects to the country's C sink between 2001 and 2010. Over this decade, we estimated that the total annual C sink in the project region was 132 Tg C per y (1 Tg = 10 g), over half of which (74 Tg C per y, 56%) was attributed to the implementation of the projects. Our results demonstrate that these restoration projects have substantially contributed to CO mitigation in China.

Does Caragana korshinskii plantation increase soil carbon continuously in a water‐limited landscape on the Loess Plateau, China?

“…Afforestation in semiarid areas has been proposed as an effective way for improving soil carbon accumulation and restoration of degraded ecosystems (Lu et al, ; Shi et al, ). Nevertheless, field studies have shown diverse response of carbon stock to afforestation, observing increase (Garcia‐Franco et al, ), decrease (Berthrong, Jobbágy, & Jackson, ; Parker, Subke, & Wookey, ), and no change (Yang, Luo, et al, ).…”

“…Drylands worldwide comprise approximately 47.2% of the terrestrial land surface and play a critical role in the global carbon cycle (Lal, ). However, the fragile semiarid ecosystem has been subjected to severe erosion and land degradation, due to the long‐term stressful excessive grazing and intensive cultivation (Lu et al, ). Afforestation has been widely launched to restore degraded ecosystems, and its effectiveness of soil erosion control and carbon sequestration was well documented in semiarid areas (Garcia‐Franco, Wiesmeier, Goberna, Martínez‐Mena, & Albaladejo, ; Lu et al, ).…”

“…However, the fragile semiarid ecosystem has been subjected to severe erosion and land degradation, due to the long‐term stressful excessive grazing and intensive cultivation (Lu et al, ). Afforestation has been widely launched to restore degraded ecosystems, and its effectiveness of soil erosion control and carbon sequestration was well documented in semiarid areas (Garcia‐Franco, Wiesmeier, Goberna, Martínez‐Mena, & Albaladejo, ; Lu et al, ). Considerable afforestation of the “Grain for Green Programme” was implemented since 1999 on the Loess Plateau, of which artificial shrubland was the main component (Feng et al, ; Lu et al, ).…”

“…Afforestation has been widely launched to restore degraded ecosystems, and its effectiveness of soil erosion control and carbon sequestration was well documented in semiarid areas (Garcia‐Franco, Wiesmeier, Goberna, Martínez‐Mena, & Albaladejo, ; Lu et al, ). Considerable afforestation of the “Grain for Green Programme” was implemented since 1999 on the Loess Plateau, of which artificial shrubland was the main component (Feng et al, ; Lu et al, ). However, the persistence contribution of these shrub plantations to soil carbon sequestration remains unknown.…”

“…(Garcia-Franco, Wiesmeier, Goberna, Martínez-Mena, & Albaladejo, 2014;Lu et al, 2018). Considerable afforestation of the "Grain for Green Programme" was implemented since 1999 on the Loess Plateau, of which artificial shrubland was the main component (Feng et al, 2016;Lu et al, 2018). However, the persistence contribution of these shrub plantations to soil carbon sequestration remains unknown.…”