【年會活動】專題演講 講者摘要

【年會活動】專題演講 講者簡介
本屆年會很榮幸能夠邀請兩位傑出年輕學者，擔任大會的專題演講（Keynote Speech）者。以下是梁國汶老師的講題摘要讓大家先睹為快！！

講題：Termites and fire: A trans-boundary research in exploring termite biodiversity in Southeast Asian tropical degraded peatland

梁國汶
Kok Boon Neoh
國立中興大學昆蟲學系Department of Entomology, National Chung Hsing University

Tropical peat swamp forests in Southeast Asia occupy approximately 72% of the global peatland. Peat swamp forests are thought to support lower species diversity than tropical rainforests. Countries with extensive peat swamp forests, such as Malaysia and Indonesia, have always regarded them as unproductive wastelands, except for the presence of valuable logs, and governments have tended to convert natural peatlands to more productive land use. Thus, the present stage of tropical swamp forest is a mosaic of different land uses, including agroindustrial planted forests and silvicultural plantations (e.g., rubber and oil palm). However, extensive forest exploitation following peat drainage for agricultural expansion leads to catastrophic peat fires. In general, cultivated peats experience fire once every four to five years. The high level of repeated fires may explain why the area covered by abandoned secondary peatland has increased two-fold from 1.2 to 3.5 Mha since 1990. Given that the absence of earthworms in acidic soil conditions in which is well known of their ecosystem service, termites are viewed as a potentially major player in a variety of ecosystem functions, as has been shown in other landscapes. Trans-boundary research effort is underway to assess the sustainability of land use in degraded peatland. The presentation will address on the impact of fire on the termite assemblage in fire-impacted peat and their possible ecosystem function at post fire. In addition, it is necessary to understand the strategies that termites adaptively employ to survive in the harsh environment. Understanding species vulnerability is fundamental for developing conservation strategies that harness ecosystem services provided by certain groups, such as restoring the fertility of increasingly degraded fire-impacted peatlands for agricultural purposes.