KULUNDA

The main goal of the interdisciplinary KULUNDA project is to mitigate degradation and desertification process, to stabilize and in the long run, to enhance carbon sequestration in soils. It as well aims to increase crop yield by development and implementation of sustainable land management practices for agricultural used areas and by that to contribute to the rural and regional development. The gained knowledge and the results of the KULUNDA project will largely contribute to the research on climate change, sustainable land management and rural and regional development. The KULUNDA project unifies the knowledge of 16 partners from German universities, research facilities, and small to medium size enterprises in eleven subprojects. The research work is divided into nine research subprojects, one subproject for scientific coordination and one subproject for the initiation of implementation project. The interdisciplinary KULUNDA project is a part of the BMBF research program, "Sustainable Land Management", Module A1 "Interaction between land management, climate change and ecosystem services".

The project is organized in four work tasks which will focus on *Analyzing the effects of agricultural management practices on soil properties and other ecosystem properties with regard to climate conditions, *Development and implementation of adopted land use practices and steppe restoration measures, *Analyzing the effects of natural and social framework on land use decisions, *Development and implementation of stakeholder driven planning and consulting platform which allows the application of sustainable land use strategies.

Im Teilvorhaben des PIK soll die regionale Kohlenstoffbilanz des Kulunda Gebiets mithilfe eine Prozess-basierten Simulationsmodells berechnet werden. Dabei werden die Erkenntnisse der anderen Teilvorhaben, Datenerhebungen im Feld und historische Rekonstruktionen integriert. Die regionale Kohlenstoffbilanz wird für die landwirtschaftlich genutzten Flächen und Systeme des Kulunda Gebietes für die Vergangenheit, die Gegenwart und mögliche zukünftige Entwicklungspfade berechnet. Ziel ist die quantitative Abschätzung der Kohlenstoffflüsse zwischen Vegetation, Boden und Atmosphäre und die Kohlenstoffmengen in Boden und Vegetation. Ein besonderes Augenmerk soll dabei auf den Veränderungen durch die landwirtschaftlichen Praktiken und die Flächeninanspruchnahme liegen.