Lahiru Wijedasa

BirdLife International

For over two decades, scientists have documented the alarming decline of global Peatland ecosystems, regarded as the planet’s most crucial carbon sinks. The deterioration of these unique wetlands alongside their policy attention presents a puzzle for policy scientists and for students of anticipatory policy design. Two contrasting explanations have...

Syzygium setosum (King) I.M. Turner (Myrtaceae), a poorly known peat swamp tree endemic to Peninsular Malaysia, is recorded for the first time in Sumatra, Indonesia. This study was conducted based on morphological characters examined on herbarium specimens of the taxon preserved at various herbaria pertinent to the Southeast Asian flora. The descri...

A new large tree species from peat swamp forest of Sumatera, Indonesia is described here with new notes on vegetative characters for the genus. Colour plates, as well as distribution, habitat, phenology, uses and observation notes are provided.

Degraded tropical peatlands lack tree cover and are often subject to seasonal flooding and repeated burning. These harsh environments for tree seedlings to survive and grow are therefore challenging to revegetate. Knowledge on species performance from previous plantings represents an important evidence base to help guide future tropical peat swamp...

Tropical peatlands store around one-sixth of the global peatland carbon pool (105 gigatonnes), equivalent to 30% of the carbon held in rainforest vegetation. Deforestation, drainage, fire and conversion to agricultural land threaten these ecosystems and their role in carbon sequestration. In this Review, we discuss the biogeochemistry of tropical p...

Wetlands have unique soil, vegetation, and biogeochemistry that arises from their landscape position and wetland hydrology, which creates low oxygen levels in the soil. With reduced oxygen availability, plants develop adaptations to survive, such as aerenchyma, that allow transport of atmospheric oxygen to their roots, and soil microbial communitie...

Peatlands are both responding to and influencing climate change. While numerous studies on peatland carbon dynamics have been published in boreal and temperate regions for decades, a much smaller yet growing body of scientific articles related to tropical peatlands has recently been published, including from previously overlooked regions such as th...

Historical vegetation studies have been of limited use in total aboveground bio- mass (AGB) estimation because they only report incomplete data consisting of tree diameter-class distributions or plot-level summaries, rather than data on each tree individual. To address this issue, we assessed an existing method (ST-n) and devel- oped three new meth...

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused global disruption, with the emergence of this and other pandemics having been linked to habitat encroachment and/or wildlife exploitation. High impacts of COVID-19 are apparent in some countries with large tropical peatland areas, some of which are relatively poorly resourced to tackle disease pandemics. Despite thi...

Restoration of peat swamp forest (PSF) on degraded Southeast Asian peatlands could reduce global carbon emissions and biodiversity loss. However, multiple ecological barriers are believed to hinder natural regeneration of native trees on degraded peatland and make restoration expensive. We evaluated if natural PSF regeneration occurs and what facto...

Carbon emissions from drained peatlands converted to agriculture in Southeast Asia (i.e. Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo) are globally significant and increasing. Here, we map the growth of Southeast Asian peatland agriculture and estimate CO2 emissions due to peat drainage in relation to official land‐use plans with a focus on the Reducing...

Memecylon maxwellii, a new limestone endemic species, is described here in honour of J. F. Maxwell. The conservation status is assessed to be critically endangered. A brief mention is made of the significance of Maxwell's specimen numbering system.

J. F. Maxwell's contribution to botanical specimen collection and taxonomy of Melastoma-taceae in Southeast Asia is outlined here. With over 31, 000 specimens, collected between 1968 and 2012, Maxwell has the highest number of plant collections in Thailand.

The conservation of tropical rainforest biodiversity is a pressing issue, due to the rapid rate of deforestation. Secondary forests may provide a useful alternative to old growth forests, as they often contain a substantial proportion of the original biodiversity. In this study, we investigate species richness, density and composition of ants and t...

The first International Peat Congress (IPC) held in the tropics - in Kuching (Malaysia) - brought together over 1000 international peatland scientists and industrial partners from across the world (“International Peat Congress with over 1000 participants!,” 2016). The congress covered all aspects of peatland ecosystems and their management, with a...

Baiting is considered to be a relatively environmentally benign termite control method; however, all commercial baiting systems are designed for species in the Rhinotermitidae and are used primarily in temperate countries. Fungus-growing termites in the Macrotermitidae can be important pests in tropical countries; they can be difficult to control u...

Haze pollution over the past four decades in Southeast Asia is mainly a result of forest and peatland fires in Indonesia. The economic impacts of haze include adverse health effects and disruption to transport and tourism. Previous studies have used a variety of approaches to assess the economic impacts of haze and the forest fires more generally....

Teks Utama: Polusi kabut selama empat dekade terakhir di Asia Tenggara terutama akibat dari kebakaran hutan dan lahan gambut di Indonesia. Dampak ekonomi dari kabut termasuk efek yang merugikan kesehatan dan gangguan transportasi dan pariwisata. Studi sebelumnya telah menggunakan berbagai pendekatan untuk menilai dampak ekonomi dari kabut dan kebak...

a new species of Hanguana (hanguanaceae), H. thailandica, is described and illustrated from Trang province, Peninsular Thailand. This is the second Hanguana species recorded in Thailand, along with the widespread helophytic H. malayana. The species is morphologically similar to Hanguana exultans and H. nitens found in swamp forests habitats in sout...

Peatland agriculture as we know it is disastrous for the haze, climate because of high emissions and in the long term will see Southeast Asia lose most of its coastline. Acknowledging the problem is the first step in the search for a solution.

Lahan gambut tropis, pertanian, keberlanjutan, emisi, subsidensi, kelapa sawit dan akasia Teks Utama: 15 International Gambut Kongres, yang diselenggarakan di Asia untuk pertama kalinya, membawa bersama-sama industri, pembuat kebijakan, dan akademisi untuk membahas pengelolaan lahan gambut yang bertanggung jawab. Di Asia Tenggara, pengelolaan lahan...

The species Memecylon cerasiforme Kurz was previously known only from the type which was collected in Chittagong, Bangladesh. A recent collection of the species from the Jaldapara National Park, West Bengal, India is not only the first since the species was described in 1877 but also the first record of its occurrence in India and the first floweri...

The first International Peat Congress (IPC) held in the tropics - in Kuching (Malaysia) - brought together over 1000 international peatland scientists and industrial partners from across the world ("International Peat Congress with over 1000 participants!," 2016). The congress covered all aspects of peatland ecosystems and their management, with a...

Konecny et al.(Konecny et al., 2015) presented results on the relationship between recurrent peatland fires and estimated carbon emissions. The study is based on Lidar elevation data measured after numerous burn events, limited soil measurements and the framework in the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2013 supplement on estimating...

Maxwell’s passing leaves a major void that will be difficult to fill. He was a classically trained and active field-based botanist, a member of an already small but essential scientific community that appears to be on the decline (Prather et al. 2004). In the several decades that we knew him, Maxwell was outspoken in his concern about the declining...

In recent months, an environmental disaster with global consequences has been unfolding in Southeast Asia. Unusually extensive and persistent fires in Indonesia have razed thousands of square kilometers of tropical forest and peatland, casting a toxic cloud of smoky haze over the region and dumping billions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. Simil...

Conservation science needs to engage the general public to ensure successful conservation interventions. Although online technologies such as Twitter and Facebook offer new opportunities to accelerate communication between conservation scientists and the online public, factors influencing the spread of conservation news in online media are not well...

Two new records of Memecylon in Cambodia.

We describe and illustrate a new species, Hanguana neglecta (Commelinales, hanguanaceae), from the Bukit Timah Nature reserve in Singapore, one of the most heavily collected and frequently visited forests in the world. the species, growing prominently near the path at the nature reserve, was not described despite being identified as new fifteen yea...

Alangium ridleyi King is lectotypified and the conservation status updated from Nationally Extinct to Endangered in Singapore and Endangered in Peninsula Malaysia.

Habitat: In a fallen 90-year old Melaleuca cajuputi tree grown in open parkland. Termites were found in soil at the base of the tree, in decayed wood under the bark, and in the heartwood of the tree. Observer: Contributor. Observation: Three species of termites were found in a 90 year old Melaleuca cajuputi which fell over during a storm (Fig. a)....

If trees could speak, what stories would they tell? For the first time ever, the Singapore Botanic Gardens has chronicled the life histories of its Heritage Trees in a book. The 29 stories in the book feature some of the oldest, tallest and most remarkable trees in the Gardens. Beautifully illustrated with photographs and paintings from both histor...

Habitat: Trunk and roots of a 90-year old Melaleuca cajuputi tree grown in open parkland. Observer: Contributor. Observation: An unidentified species of wood-feeding fungus was observed in an old gelam tree (Fig. 1a) which fell during a storm (Fig. 1b). The gelam is known for its medicinal properties which is a form of natural protection for the tr...

Landsat can be used to map tropical forest cover at 15–60 m resolution, which is helpful for detecting small but important perturbations in increasingly fragmented forests. However, among the remaining Landsat satellites, Landsat-5 no longer has global coverage and, since 2003, a mechanical fault in the Scan-Line Corrector (SLC-Off) of the Landsat-...

Memecylon corticosum is re-circumscribed to include M. kratense as a variety, and M. caudatum is considered synonymous with M. corticosum var. corticosum. A new combination has been made for M. pauciflorum var. brevifolium as it is considered conspecific to M. scutellatum, and is recognised as a variety. Finally, the new species M. perplexum is des...

Tropical peat swamp forest is a unique ecosystem that is most extensive in Southeast Asia, where it is under enormous threat from logging, fire, and land conversion. Recent research has shown this ecosystem's significance as a global carbon store, but its value for biodiversity remains poorly understood. We review the current status and biological...