Land use change leads to increased flooding in Indonesia

Date:
August 27, 2020
Source:
University of Go"ttingen
Summary:
While high greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss are
often associated with rapid land-use change in Indonesia, impacts
on local water cycles have been largely overlooked. Researchers
now show that the expansion of monocultures, such as oil palm and
rubber plantations, leads to more frequent and more severe flooding.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== While high greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss are often
associated with rapid land-use change in Indonesia, impacts on local water cycles have been largely overlooked. Researchers from the University of Go"ttingen, IPB University in Bogor and BMKG in Jakarta have now published
a new study on this issue. They show that the expansion of monocultures,
such as oil palm and rubber plantations, leads to more frequent and more
severe flooding. The multidisciplinary team explains this increase in
flooding with a complex interplay of ecohydrological and social processes, including soil degradation in monocultures, the expansion of oil palm plantations into wetlands, and the construction of flood protection
dams. The results have been published in the journal Ecology & Society.


==========================================================================
For the study, the authors conducted almost 100 interviews with Indonesian smallholders, people from the village and decision-makers in the Jambi
province of Sumatra. They then compared and supplemented their analyses
of these results with scientific measurements of precipitation, river
and groundwater levels, soil properties as well as land use mapping from
the region. "Many studies on the relationship between land use changes
and flooding are only based on analyses by individual disciplines and
thus provide only fragmentary insights into the underlying processes,"
says lead author Jennifer Merten, Department of Human Geography at the University of Go"ttingen. "It was therefore important for us to use the
widest possible range of data from different disciplines and also to
include observations from the local population." In their study, the scientists of the German-Indonesian Collaborative Research Centre EFForTS (Ecological and Socio-Economic Functions of Tropical Lowland Rainforest Transformation Systems) show that the current expansion of oil palm and
rubber plantations has a significant impact on local water cycles. "The large-scale land-use change leads to a compaction of the soil, so that
less rain is absorbed by the soil and the water quickly runs off at the surface," explains co-author Christian Stiegler, Bioclimatology Group at
the University of Go"ttingen. "In particular, the advancing destruction
of floodplains plays an important role in this process." From the
perspective of the village population, the construction of flood dams
and drainage channels also contributes to a change in local patterns
of flooding. As oil palm plantations in particular are increasingly
cultivated in wetlands such as river floodplains or peatlands, larger plantation owners are trying to control flooding on their land by means of
such constructions. "However, such dams often lead to increased flooding
on neighbouring smallholder plantations," Merten reports following her experiences from the area. This means that the observed increase in
flooding also leads to new social tensions and conflicts.

In order to reduce the impact of land use change on the water cycle, soil protection and improved land use planning, especially in floodplains and wetlands, can play an important role. "Yet, it is just as important to
regulate and control landscape interventions for flood protection and
drainage more closely," says Merten. "Otherwise it might happen that
the effects of increasing flooding will affect above all the poorest in society, because larger companies simply pass on the water."

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Go"ttingen. Note:
Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Jennifer Merten, Christian Stiegler, Nina Hennings, Edwine
S. Purnama,
Alexander Ro"ll, Herdhata Agusta, Michaela A. Dippold, Lutz
Fehrmann, Dodo Gunawan, Dirk Ho"lscher, Alexander Knohl, Johanna
Ku"ckes, Fenna Otten, Delphine C. Zemp, Heiko Faust. Flooding
and land use change in Jambi Province, Sumatra: integrating local
knowledge and scientific inquiry. Ecology and Society, 2020; 25
(3) DOI: 10.5751/ES-11678-250314 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/08/200827133549.htm

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