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19
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Introduction
Research focus on land use and adaptive land management in the African context with regard to several aspects of socio-ecological systems such as biodiversity and ecosystems, biogeochemical cycling, agriculture and forestry. Main research objectives are to contribute to a deeper understanding of the African greenhouse gas cycle through improving national and regional estimates of greenhouse gas fluxes and identifying natural climate solution pathways that can inform land use management.
Current institution
Additional affiliations
October 2018 - present
Education
September 2011 - October 2018
Publications
Publications (19)
A key goal of the Paris Agreement (PA) is to reach net-zero Greenhouse Gasses (GHG) emissions by 2050 globally, which requires mitigation efforts from all countries. Africa’s rapidly growing population and GDP makes this continent important for GHG emission trends. In this paper, we study the emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nit...
Vegetation phenology plays an important role in the inter-annual variability of Net Ecosystem Exchange (NEE). However, the relationship between vegetation phenology and NEE is still largely unknown in the southern African region. The relatively recent availability of Eddy-Covariance (EC) flux towers in the region, which allow for measurements of th...
Plantation forests were introduced into South Africa to satisfy the regional demand for wood-based products, which are largely found in the Mpumalanga province. To better understand the impacts of climate on the dominant height growth of commercially important plantation species, enumeration data collected from 2012 to 2023 was scrutinised, represe...
As part of the REgional Carbon Cycle Assessment and Processes Phase 2 (RECCAP2) project, we developed a comprehensive African Greenhouse gases (GHG) budget covering 2000 to 2019 (RECCAP1 and RECCAP2 time periods), and assessed uncertainties and trends over time. We compared bottom‐up process‐based models, data‐driven remotely sensed products, and n...
A key goal of the Paris Agreement (PA) is to reach net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050 globally, which requires mitigation efforts from all countries. Africa's rapidly growing population and gross domestic product (GDP) make this continent important for GHG emission trends. In this paper, we study the emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2),...
Rising greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Africa is a cause for concern. With a growing population and its associated requirements for energy, food and socio-economic development, climate change impacts will further exacerbate the current trend. A recent greenhouse gas budget for Africa synthesised the most current and comprehensive modelling and ob...
Projections of future carbon sinks and stocks are important because they show how the world's ecosystems will respond to elevated CO2 and changes in climate. Moreover, they are crucial to inform policy decisions around emissions reductions to stay within the global warming levels identified by the Paris Agreement. However, Earth System Models from...
As part of the REgional Carbon Cycle Assessment and Processes Phase 2 (RECCAP2) project, we developed a comprehensive African Greenhouse gases (GHG) budget for the period 2010-2019 and compared it to the budget over the 1985-2009 (RECCAP1) period. We considered bottom-up process-based models, data-driven remotely sensed products, and national GHG i...
Africa contributes significantly to the global carbon budget through its absolute contribution and inter-annual variability. The African carbon cycle is also unique in having vast areas covered by savannas that are strongly influenced by anthropogenic land use, fire and herbivore dynamics. Here we aim to provide updated carbon and Greenhouse Gas (G...
Elephants live in heterogeneous landscapes where their search for resources may increase individual survival. The uneven distribution of such resources may be linked to landscape heterogeneity. We therefore hypothesized that landscape heterogeneity determines elephant home range location and size in Etosha National Park, Khaudum Game Reserve and Ng...
![Figure 2: The home range sizes (range [min, max] with mean) across...](profile/Yolandi-Ernst/publication/281290012/figure/fig2/AS:391530482290697@1470359549962/The-home-range-sizes-range-min-max-with-mean-across-southern-Africa-of-elephant_Q320.jpg)
T HE PREVAILING INCREASE IN ELEPHANT numbers across areas of southern Africa raises concern for their impact on biological diversity. Several approaches to elephant management focus on limiting numbers to alleviate these consequences. However, landscape fragmentation, fences, water supple-mentation as well as the shape and size of some conservation...
Elephants, the distribution of water sources and below-average rainfall may threaten the survival of woody plants in Etosha National Park, Namibia. We base our assessment of such interactions on the satellite tracking of six elephant herds following a 17-year record of fixed-point photographs. These showed that woody plant survival increased and sp...
Questions
Questions (2)
I processed MODIS MOD13Q1 NDVI times series (from 2000 to 2015) in Timesat. I specifically extracted start of season data and for each year (growth season) I was able to produce an image showing the SOS across my study area using the seas2img function. I was able to save these images as pictures but fail to understand how these images can be exported in a raster format that I will be able to use in ArcMAP in order to do further analyses. Please advise if this is at all possible and what process I need to follow to get it done
I have mean-variance plots of annual NDVI from different data sets. I would like to compare the trajectories of these plots, but not sure what would be the best way to do it. Any suggestions are welcome.
