Transpiration on the rebound in lowland Sumatra

Following large-scale conversion of rainforest, rubber and oil palm plantations dominate lowland Sumatra (Indonesia) and other parts of South East Asia today, with potentially far-reaching ecohydrological consequences. We assessed how such land-use change affects plant transpiration by sap flux measurements at 42 sites in selectively logged rainforests, agroforests and rubber and oil palm monoculture plantations in the lowlands of Sumatra. Site-to-site variability in stand-scale transpiration and tree-level water use were explained by stand structure, productivity, soil properties and plantation age. Along a land-use change trajectory forest rubber-oil palm, time-averaged transpiration decreases by 43 +/- 11% from forest to rubber monoculture plantations, but rebounds with conversion to smallholder oil palm plantations. We uncovered that particularly commercial, intensive oil palm cultivation leads to high transpiration (827 +/- 77 mm yr(-1)), substantially surpassing rates at our forest sites (589 +/- 52 mm yr(-1)). Compared to smallholder oil palm, land-use intensification leads to 1.7-times higher transpiration in commercial plantations. Combined with severe soil degradation, the high transpiration may cause periodical water scarcity for humans in oil palm-dominated landscapes. As oil palm is projected to further expand, severe shifts in water cycling after land-cover change and water scarcity due to land-use intensification may become more widespread.German Research Foundation (DFG) [CRC 990]; Indonesian-German Scholarship Programme (IGSP); China Scholarship Council (CSC)24 month embargo; available online 13 May 2019This item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at repository@u.library.arizona.edu