The role of protected areas co-management in enhancing resistance and resilience of deciduous forest ecosystem to extreme climatic events in Bangladesh

Due to ongoing and projected climate change as well as increasing anthropogenic disturbances, the tropical deciduous forest has been experiencing a decline in its biomass and productivity. To mitigate this adverse effect, many tropical countries have adopted forest co-management engaging local communities. However, the effects of co-management on the resistance and resilience of forest ecosystems to extreme climatic events have rarely been tested. The present study investigates the effects of co-management on resistance and resilience to extreme climatic events in two major tropical deciduous forest protected areas of Bangladesh, namely Madhupur National Park (MNP) and Bhawal National Park (BNP), through remotely sensed satellite data. We used the Google Earth Engine platform to access the Landsat images from 1990 to 2020 for a comprehensive assessment of the forest cover condition under two major management regimes (i.e., traditional and co-management). We find that co-management slows down the rate of forest destruction, where the rate of forest destruction was 108 ha year(-1) in MNP and 121 ha year(-1) in BNP during the year 1990-2008 under traditional forest management system. Under the co-management regime, forest cover increased by 19 ha year(-1) and 41 ha year(-1) from 2009 to 2020 respectively in MNP and BNP. Our study finds a highly significant correlation between rainfall (p < 0.001) and forest health, although co-management had poor impacts on forest resistance and resilience in case of extreme climatic events, such as drought and heavy rainfall. We find, no significant impacts of co-management on resistance and resilience to drought in MNP, and on resistance and resilience to heavy rainfall in MNP and BNP. In BNP, the impacts of co-management on resistance (p < 0.05) and resilience (p < 0.01) of forest to drought were highly significant. Forest co-management although have the potentials to reduce the deforestation rate by mitigating anthropogenic disturbances, its capacity to tackle the adverse impact of climate change was limited in our study. An adaptive co-management model, therefore, is crucial for mainstreaming the adverse effect of climate change on the tropical deciduous forest to harness the maximum potential of community participation in forest resources management.

Automated summary

Tropical deciduous forests are experiencing a decline in biomass and productivity due to climate change and anthropogenic disturbances. Forest co-management has been adopted by many countries to mitigate these effects, but its impact on the resistance and resilience of forest ecosystems to extreme climatic events is limited. This study used remotely sensed satellite data to investigate the effects of co-management on resistance and resilience in two major protected areas in Bangladesh. The results showed that co-management slows down the rate of forest destruction, but has poor impacts on forest resistance and resilience to extreme climatic events such as drought and heavy rainfall.