Estimation of carbon stock in church forests: Implications for managing church forest to help with carbon emission reduction

Abstract

Forests play a significant role in climate change mitigation by sequestering and storing more carbon from the atmosphere than any other terrestrial ecosystem. Church forests, including other sacred places, are relatively more protected than forests in any other places. The overall objective of this study was to estimate the contribution of church forests to the reduction of atmospheric carbon concentration by conducting case studies on selected churches in Addis Ababa:—Seven churches was selected to estimate carbon in above and below ground biomass; dead litter and soil; each tree in the study site which had Diameter at breast height (DBH) greater than 10 cm was measured for DBH, height, basal height, and crown height while sampling of dead litter and soil carbon was conducted by sampling quadrates. Above ground biomass was estimated by using allometric models while below ground biomass was determined based on the ratio of below ground biomass to above ground biomass. The results show that there are 1,519 trees in the study sites which had DBH > 10 cm. The mean above ground and below ground biomass carbon stock ranged from 129.85 ± 154.11 and 25.97 ± 30.82 t ha−1, respectively. The mean above ground biomass carbon per tree was 0.6 ± 0.69 t. The mean carbon in dead litter and soil carbon was 17.83 ± 19.13 and 135.94 ± 21.25 t ha−1 respectively. From the point of view managing forests for climate change mitigation, the result suggested well managed sacred forests could have a significantly contribution to carbon emission reduction and enhancing in situ conservation of biodiversity.