[Answered] “The recent, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on ‘Climate Change and Land’ highlight that unless land is managed in a sustainable manner, it will be difficult for humanity to prevent climate change.” Discuss.

Demand of the question
Introduction. Contextual Introduction.
Body. Major findings of the report. Why land management is important for prevention of climate change?
Conclusion. Way forward.

Land provides the principal basis for human livelihoods and well-being including the supply of food, freshwater and multiple other ecosystem services, as well as biodiversity. Human use directly affects more than 70% of the global land surface. Land also plays an important role in the climate system.  Since the pre-industrial period, changes in land cover due to human activities have led to both a net release of CO2 contributing to global warming.

Major findings of the report:

  1. About 23% of global human-caused greenhouse gas emissions come from agriculture, forestry and other land uses.
  2. Despite increased deforestation and other land use changes, the world’s lands are removing more emissions than they emit. Deforestation and land degradation, though, will chip away this carbon sink.
  3. This warming has already had devastating impacts on the land, including wildfires, changes to rainfall and heat waves. Further impacts will impair land’s ability to act as a carbon sink.
  4. Several land-based climate solutions can reduce emissions and/or remove carbon from the atmosphere. The largest potential for reducing emissions from the land sector is from curbing deforestation and forest degradation.
  5. In addition to reducing emissions, the land sector can also remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The report found that afforestation and reforestation have the greatest carbon removal potential.
  6. In particular, land-based climate solutions that require large land areas could threaten food security and exacerbate environmental problems.

Why land management is important for prevention of climate change?

  1. Land provides the basis for many ecosystem functions and services including cultural and regulating services, that are essential for humanity. Worlds’ terrestrial ecosystem services have been valued on an annual basis to be approximately equivalent to the annual global Gross Domestic Product.
  2. Land is both a source and a sink of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and plays a key role in the exchange of energy, water and aerosols between the land surface and atmosphere.
  3. Land ecosystems and biodiversity are vulnerable to ongoing climate change and weather and climate extremes, to different extents.
  4. Sustainable land management can contribute to reducing the negative impacts of multiple stressors, including climate change, on ecosystems and societies.
  5. Global models found increase in CO2 emissions from land use and land-use change during 2007-16. These net emissions are mostly due to deforestation, partly offset by afforestation/reforestation, and emissions and removals by other land use activities. Desertification amplifies global warming through the release of CO2 linked with the decrease in vegetation cover.
  6. Changes in land conditions, either from land-use or climate change, affect global and regional climate. At the regional scale, changing land conditions can reduce or accentuate warming and affect the intensity, frequency and duration of extreme events.
  7. Changes in forest cover for example from afforestation, reforestation and deforestation, directly affect regional surface temperature through exchanges of water and energy. Increased evapotranspiration can result in cooler days during the growing season and can reduce the amplitude of heat related events.
  8. Both global warming and urbanisation can enhance warming in cities and their surroundings (heat island effect), especially during heat related events, including heat waves. Increased urbanisation put pressure on land that can also intensify extreme rainfall events over the city or downwind of urban areas.
  9. The forest and land use measures could reduce net carbon emissions by the equivalent of 10-20% of projected fossil fuel emissions through 2050.

Forestry and land use practices hold considerable potential for counteracting the effect of greenhouse gas emissions, helping to prevent significant climate change. These practices include focusing on planting trees, preserving and properly managing forests, and changing cultivation practices to account for increased carbon storage in the soil. Such practices could make it possible to increase carbon sinks while further reducing the emission of greenhouse gases.

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