Final Report Summary - ECO-DYNAMIC-AFRICA (Tropical forests in East Africa - Relationships between ecosystem diversity / ecosystem function and environmental gradients)
The two main research foci of ECO-DYNAMIC-AFRICA included: 1) analysis of causal relationships between environmental gradients and ecosystem diversity in East African forests and 2) assessment of feedbacks between tropical forests and environmental change processes. East Africa was the focus of this proposal as it is an area of strong gradients in ecosystems and environment and an area where future climate changes will significantly affect wildlife, humans and ecosystem service provision. The forests investigated incorporate diversity hotspots and are of high local economic importance. Also, the suspected loss of forests, which is widely acknowledged in tropical countries, was expected to result in emissions of greenhouse gases contributing to global warming. The findings are important for carbon mitigation based policies and conservation, including UN-REDD+. The work directly contributes to WWF Tanzania – REDD project.