2019年11月28日 星期四

Scientists Now on Staff 旅遊業流行生態之旅 秘魯這飯店聘科學家開工作坊


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2019/12/06 第287期 訂閱/退訂看歷史報份
 
 
紐時周報精選 Preserving Intact Forests Can Reduce Emissions 森林消失中 完整森林有更好的減碳效果
Scientists Now on Staff 旅遊業流行生態之旅 秘魯這飯店聘科學家開工作坊
紐時周報精選
 
Preserving Intact Forests Can Reduce Emissions 森林消失中 完整森林有更好的減碳效果
文/Henry Fountain
譯/莊蕙嘉

保存原始林 降低碳排量

Forests are a great bulwark against climate change, so programs to reduce deforestation are important. Those efforts usually focus on stopping the destruction in areas where it is already occurring.

森林是對抗氣候變遷的重要堡壘,因此減少森林濫伐計畫很重要。這些努力常聚焦於已遭濫伐區,讓破壞不再繼續。

But a new study suggests these programs would do well to also to preserve forests where deforestation and degradation have not begun. Gradual loss of these largely pristine, intact forests has a much greater climate effect than previously accounted for, the researchers said.

但新研究指出,這些計畫若同時著力於保護濫伐和劣化尚未開始的森林,成效會更好。研究員說,這些大抵原始且未受侵擾的森林逐漸流失,對氣候變遷影響遠比原本評估大。

Globally, forests take more than a quarter of the carbon emissions from human activities out of the atmosphere every year. Intact forests are especially effective at storing carbon — although only about 20% of tropical forests are considered relatively pristine, they are responsible for about 40% of carbon storage in the tropics.

就全球而言,森林每年自大氣吸收的碳,超過人類活動製造的總碳排放量的四分之一。完整的森林貯碳能力又特別強,雖然約僅20%熱帶森林被視為相對原始,它們的碳貯存量在熱帶森林碳貯存總量中的占比,卻約達40%。

The study, by researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society, the University of Queensland in Australia and other institutions, analyzed carbon emissions from the loss of intact tropical forests worldwide from 2000 to 2013.

這項研究由國際野生生物保育學會、澳洲昆士蘭大學和一些機構合作進行,分析自2000年至2013年間,全球完整熱帶森林流失導致的碳排放量。

Immediate clearing of intact forests, what might be considered "classic" deforestation, over that period accounted for about 3% of global emissions from deforestation in all tropical forests, the researchers said. But when they looked at other, more gradual types of loss and disturbance — forests that had been opened to selective logging, for example, or road-building that exposed more trees — they found that the carbon effect increased sixfold over the period.

完整森林直接完全砍伐,可視為「典型的」去森林化。研究人員說,那段期間,全球熱帶森林砍伐所產生的碳排放,完全砍伐的占比約3%,但在檢視並計入其他更漸進式的森林消失和侵擾,例如森林開放供選擇性砍伐,或是因開闢道路而使更多樹木曝露後,他們發現碳排占比竟增高了六倍。

"It's alarming, because there are huge amounts of intact forest being disturbed every year," said Tom Evans, who leads the forest conservation program at the Wildlife Conservation Society and was a co-author of the paper, which was published in Science Advances.

湯姆.伊凡斯是國際野生生物保育學會的森林保育計畫負責人,也是刊載於「科學進展」期刊的前述報告的共同作者,他說:「這個結果令人不安,因為每年都有數量龐大的完整森林受到侵擾。」。

The study amounts to a more complete accounting of the carbon effect of forest loss. Some of the effect comes not from newly accounted for emissions but from what the researchers called "forgone removals" — a degraded or disturbed forest takes up less carbon from the atmosphere than a fully intact one.

關於森林流失對減碳的影響,這分研究作出了更加完整的說明。這個影響一部分並非來自新的排放,而是來自研究人員所稱的「喪失的吸存移除(碳)量」,意指比起完整無缺的森林,劣化或受侵擾的森林自大氣捕集的碳變少了。

"These forests are working for us each year, soaking up large amounts of carbon," Evans said. "But we don't account for that when the damage happens."

「這些森林每年為我們工作,吸收大量的碳。」伊凡斯說。「但是在森林受到損害時,我們卻沒有正視它的影響。」

For one thing, if preserving an intact forest has a climate impact six times greater than previously thought, perhaps the financial incentive to preserve it should be substantially higher, he said.

比方說吧,如果保護一座完整森林的氣候效果比過去以為的好上六倍,或許保存森林的財務獎勵應該大幅提高。

International programs like Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, or REDD+, are seen as a way to help limit global warming by using financial incentives to halt ongoing deforestation, thus conserving forests' carbon-storing capabilities.

諸如「減少森林濫伐及森林退化碳排放」(或稱作REDD+)這樣的國際計畫,被視為限制全球暖化的一種方式,做法是藉由提供財務獎勵遏止進行中的森林砍伐,從而守護森林貯碳的能力。

※說文解字看新聞

本文報導碳排放研究的新發現,完整的森林(intact forests)有更好的減碳效果。完整森林也就是保育界所謂「未受(人類) 侵擾的原始森林」,除吸存大量溫室氣體二氧化碳,抑制暖化外,更為陸生野生動物(terrestrial wildlife)提供棲息地(habitat),十分重要。

deforestation是deforest的名詞,指林木被大面積砍伐,焚燒,導致森林消失的現象,有「濫伐」「毀林」、「去森林化」等多種譯法。

degradation/degrade指事物狀態變差,文中指森林劣化,包括樹木數量、樹種、棲息生物等逐漸減少的過程。

preserve和conserve都是談到環保時常見的字彙,都有protect something from loss or change的含意。preserve常譯為保存,主要指盡力維持其原有狀態,勿使損傷劣化。conserve多譯為保存,強調妥善管理或節省使用資源,讓耗損量低於替補量,除了保存,還要孕育,以求永續。

 
Scientists Now on Staff 旅遊業流行生態之旅 秘魯這飯店聘科學家開工作坊
文/Abby Ellin
譯/陳韋廷

生態之旅聘科學家

Carmen Soto is a research scientist, with a master's degree in ecology and natural resources from the National University of Saint Anthony the Abbot in Cuzco, Peru. In 1999, while writing her thesis on the "biological control for the potato moth and virus translocation in potatoes," she met José Koechlin, the founder and chief executive of Inkaterra Hotels in Peru. He wanted to figure out how to control the wood weevil and moth, both of which had been attacking the eucalyptus beams and other wood used in building Inkaterra's Machu Picchu Pueblo Hotel. He offered Soto a full-time job to help him.

卡門.索托是研究科學家,擁有秘魯庫斯科聖安東尼艾博特國立大學的生態學與自然資源碩士學位。1999年,她在撰寫題為《馬鈴薯蛾的生物防治與馬鈴薯病毒轉移》論文時,遇見秘魯茵卡特拉飯店創辦人兼執行長何塞·科切林。科切林想弄清楚如何防治木頭象鼻蟲跟蛾,這兩種蟲一直在攻擊用來建造茵卡特拉馬丘比丘村飯店的桉樹樑與其他木材,於是他提供索托一份全職工作來幫忙。

Within a year, Soto was the resident biologist and orchid specialist at that hotel and at Inkaterra Asociación, the company's nonprofit organization. Since then, she and her team of nearly a dozen workers have helped identify 372 orchid species, 22 of which are new. While continuing to identify new species of birds, butterflies and flora in the cloud forest, she also organizes specialized excursions for guests and educational workshops for area schoolchildren.

不出一年,索托成了該飯店及所屬公司非營利組織茵卡特拉協會的常駐生物學家和蘭花專家。到目前為止,她跟近十幾個員工的團隊幫助鑑定了372種蘭花,其中22種是新品種。在雲霧森林內持續鑑定鳥類、蝴蝶與植物新物種的同時,她還幫房客舉辦專門性的短程旅行,並為當地學童辦了教育講習班。

Eco-tourism has been a buzzword in the travel industry for some time now, with more and more hotels giving guests the option to reuse their sheets or to forgo housekeeping entirely in an effort to "protect the environment". But some hotels, lodges and resorts have taken similar steps as Inkaterra, hiring scientists to conduct serious academic inquiry while also offering nature tours, workshops and classes for guests.

生態旅遊成為旅行業的流行語已有相當時日,愈來愈多飯店讓房客選擇重複使用床單或放棄房務整理,以「保護環境」,但一些飯店、小型旅館和度假村已採取跟茵卡特拉類似的措施,聘用科學家進行嚴肅的學術調查,同時為房客提供自然旅遊、工作坊和課程。

Hotel owners and managers say their ecological efforts trump any financial hits they may take.

飯店老闆和經理說,他們的生態努力勝過了任何他們可能遭受的經濟損失。

"Inkaterra has always had a very important global commitment to sustainability," said Claire Andre, the research and development manager at Inkaterra Hotels. "If taken separately it may not be economically profitable"

茵卡特拉飯店研發經理克萊兒.安德里說:「茵卡特拉一直對永續性有著非常重要的全球承諾。若是分開來做的話,可能不會帶來經濟利益。」

Two years ago, Mashpi Lodge, perched at 3,117 feet and about a 3 1/2-hour drive from Quito, Ecuador, opened a research lab on its premises. The laboratory is accessible to guests as well as international students working on their dissertations.

兩年前,海拔3117英尺、距厄瓜多首都基多約三個半小時車程的馬緒比旅館,在自家用地上開設一個研究實驗室,而房客以及正在撰寫學位論文的外國學生均可使用該實驗室。

The lab is the creation of Carlos Morochz, who was hired two years before the lodge opened specifically "to conduct a thorough scientific study to fully understand the ecosystems within the reserve and gather as much information as possible about the plant and wildlife of the cloud and rainforests," said Mashpi's founder, Roque Sevilla. Today, Mashpi has 12 biologists on staff, and seven studies have been published about the frogs, flowers, butterflies and birds found there.

馬緒比旅館創始人羅克·賽維亞表示,實驗室是旅館開業的兩年之前即雇用的卡洛斯·莫洛茲所創立,而實驗室專門用以進行全面科學研究,以充分了解保護區內的生態系統,並盡可能地收集有關雲霧森林和雨林內植物與野生動物的資訊。目前,馬緒比旅館聘有12名生物學家,且已發表7篇有關當地蛙、花卉、蝴蝶和鳥類的研究報告。

 
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