An assessment of long-term climate patterns on the ecology of Southeast Asian forest and wetland habitats

In order to predict the impacts of climate change on human and natural ecosystems, we first need to describe how target systems have responded historically to climate variation in the past, then in conjunction with climate models, we can make relatively informed predictions on how systems will likely respond in the future. While institutions in Europe, North America, Japan and Australia have been collecting baseline long-term datasets for many years (sometimes hundreds of years), long-term datasets are extremely rare in Thailand and Southeast Asia. Here we propose to conduct both retrospective (30 years past to present) and predictive analyses (30 years into the future) on a range of natural systems, including forests and forest fruit production, wetland systems, in conjunction with measures of food resources and population dynamics of key forest and wetland bird and mammal species. We will also establish baseline datasets related to food resources for the target species. The results will provide greater understanding of the possible changes in natural habitats in the region following changes in climatic conditions, particularly strong El Nino and La Nina events and how selected species are likely to respond. Our results will help researchers understand future dynamics of droughts and floods, particularly those of exceptional nature which are likely to strongly affect regional agricultural production.