{"title":"Are peatland farming systems sustainable? Case study on assessing existing farming systems in the peatland of Central Kalimantan, Indonesia","authors":"Arif Surahman, P. Soni, G. Shivakoti","doi":"10.1080/1943815X.2017.1412326","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Economically, peatland plays an important role since they can be reclaimed for agriculture. Shallow peat (<100 cm) can be used to grow food crops including vegetables. Peatland has also become attractive for development of large-scale oil palm and rubber plantations. However, peatland has a number of constraints in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission, especially CO2 emissions in the degraded peatland. These arise from decomposition of peat. Common sense suggests three alternatives to manage GHG emissions from degraded peatland: conservation and restoration, natural recovery, and agricultural use. In this context, the challenge is to utilize degraded tropical peatland for agriculture while avoiding the negative impacts, and ensuring its environmental sustainability. This research attempts to contribute toward developing better management plans. Results of this study show that rice farming has highest sustainable score in degraded peatland. Rice farming secured a 52.14% sustainability score, while oil palm and rubber farming exhibited 47.55 and 47.67% sustainable scores, respectively. Therefore, rice farming can be considered as the first alternative for development of degraded peatland. Improved oil palm and rubber farming systems may also be subsequently considered if their sustainability can be improved.","PeriodicalId":16194,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences","volume":"14 1","pages":"1 - 19"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6000,"publicationDate":"2018-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"34","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1943815X.2017.1412326","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 34
Abstract
Abstract Economically, peatland plays an important role since they can be reclaimed for agriculture. Shallow peat (<100 cm) can be used to grow food crops including vegetables. Peatland has also become attractive for development of large-scale oil palm and rubber plantations. However, peatland has a number of constraints in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission, especially CO2 emissions in the degraded peatland. These arise from decomposition of peat. Common sense suggests three alternatives to manage GHG emissions from degraded peatland: conservation and restoration, natural recovery, and agricultural use. In this context, the challenge is to utilize degraded tropical peatland for agriculture while avoiding the negative impacts, and ensuring its environmental sustainability. This research attempts to contribute toward developing better management plans. Results of this study show that rice farming has highest sustainable score in degraded peatland. Rice farming secured a 52.14% sustainability score, while oil palm and rubber farming exhibited 47.55 and 47.67% sustainable scores, respectively. Therefore, rice farming can be considered as the first alternative for development of degraded peatland. Improved oil palm and rubber farming systems may also be subsequently considered if their sustainability can be improved.
期刊介绍:
Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences (JIES) provides a stimulating, informative and critical forum for intellectual debate on significant environmental issues. It brings together perspectives from a wide range of disciplines and methodologies in both the social and natural sciences in an effort to develop integrative knowledge about the processes responsible for environmental change. The Journal is especially concerned with the relationships between science, society and policy and one of its key aims is to advance understanding of the theory and practice of sustainable development.