Several per cent of the carbon, originally fixed by forests or grasslands, is transported to small brooks and rivers. These carbon fluxes have received a lot of attention in boreal and temperate ecosystems, but fluxes in the tropics need to be better understood. The role of different land uses in carbon exports especially needs clarification. Apart from being an important part of the global carbon balance, the export of carbon from terrestrial ecosystems critically impacts water quality and the ecology of rivers. Our project will, as a collaboration of UEF and three Latin American higher education institutions, improve the quantification of carbon fluxes and investigate how different land uses affect water quality. The work will use state-of-the-art statistical and analytical methods. The work can be used to establish priorities for land management (like ecosystem restoration, afforestation or agricultural development) in the tropics.

2024

2028