The tracking of land use since 1990 presents a
major challenge in greenhouse gas (GHG) reporting under the United Nations Fra
mework Convention on Cli
mate
Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol because there is often li
mited availability of data, especially for the base year of 1990. There is even less land
manage
ment and soil
moisture data, which are needed to track cli
mate
change
mitigation activities since soil
moisture is one of the
main drivers of GHG e
missions of organic soils. Infor
mation is also needed for the reporting of land-based activities such as grazing land
manage
ment or wetland drainage and rewetting of organic soils. Different spatial and the
matic resolutions of land-use data produce inconsistent ti
me series with a strong overesti
mation of land-use
change (LUC) if not adequately accounted for. Our ai
m was to create a consistent ti
me series of land use since 1990 that is in line with GHG reporting under the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol by co
mbining official cadastral data with colour-infrared aerial photography used for biodiversity
monitoring in si
x federal states in northern and eastern Ger
many. We developed a generic hierarchical classification by land use,
manage
ment and drainage status, and a translation key for data har
monisation into a consistent ti
me series. This ti
me series enabled the quantification of LUC on organic soils between 1992 and 2013 in a spatially e
xplicit
manner. Further
more we used this ti
me series to develop indicators for
changes in land
manage
ment and drainage to evaluate the success of protection statuses on peatland restoration.
The study area encompassed one million hectares, half of which had some type of legal nature protection status. Areas with no protection status tended to become more intensively farmed and drier, while highly protected areas (m>e.g.m> Natura 2000) showed the opposite trend. Land-use trends also differed greatly between federal states. In Schleswig-Holstein organic soils tended to become drier during the study period, while in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania they tended to become wetter overall. The trends and differences in LUC between federal states were linked to German reunification, changes in the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and Germany's Renewable Energy Act (EEG). A large-scale peatland protection programme also had major impact.
In conclusion, our study demonstrates how data derived for biodiversity monitoring and other highly detailed land-use data can be used to track changes in land use, management and drainage status in accordance with the reporting requirements under the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol.