IMPACTS OF LAND-USE CHANGE ON PEATLAND DEGRADATION: A REVIEW

Abstract

This paper presents a topical overview of peatland degradation as a result of land-use change by reviewing previous studies and looking for the converging results of interest so as to proffer possible solutions to this menace. As a result of rising awareness of climate change and its negative influence on our environment, many studies are being tailored towards the main drivers of climate change and the contributions of both human and natural activities towards the effects of climate change on our environments. Lots of commendable results have been achieved so far, and the major sources of these drivers of climate change have been discovered which have now limited the studies to particular areas of research. Peatlands, mostly found to be carbon stores, have been discovered to store very large amount of other major nutrients apart from carbon which, if not maintained within the peatland, could have serious and negative influence on our environment if allowed to escape to the atmosphere. The escape of these major nutrients like carbon dioxide, CO2, and nitrous oxide, N2O locked up within these peatlands as a result of land-use change has seriously degraded these peatlands, thereby making them becoming more of carbon sources than carbon stores which in turn aggravates the dangers of global warming. The review, therefore, tends to bridge the gap between the agricultural expansion which was caused by increase in oil palm demands that resulted to change in land use such as deforestation and the subsequent degradation of peatland and the associated food supply concerns.