Endangered biodiversity in tropical peat-swamps in relation to their ecological risk

Peat-swamp-forest ecosystems in the Tropical Asia contain unique vegetation with a high proportion of indigenous taxa. Large areas of natural peat-swamp forests remained in their natural state in Southeast Asia until the 1970s. From that time, however, development activities in these areas, such as large-scale irrigation projects, began to increase, introducing many environmental and social problems. Tropical forests are drawing worldwide attention from researchers, but only a small proportion of them and their ecosystems have been catalogued. In this paper we focus on Asian tropical swamp vegetation from the ecological point of view, and consider possibilities for establishing a sustainable land use system in order to protect endangered tropical biodiversity