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Pak. J. Bot., 47(SI): 359-366, 2015.

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APPLICATION OF HOLDRIDGE LIFE ZONES (HLZ) IN PAKISTAN

SYED MAHMOOD NASIR^1*, MUHAMMAD AFRASIYAB¹ AND MOHAMMAD ATHAR²

¹Office of the Inspector General of Forests, Climate Change Division, LG and RD Complex, G-5/2 Islamabad, Pakistan

²Adjunct Professor, Department of Food Science and Technology University of Karachi, Karachi-75270

^*Corresponding author: igf.moenv@gmail.com; Tel: +92-51-9245589; Fax: +92-51-9245590.

Abstract: Classification of an ecosystem is important in understanding climate change. This paper examines and juxtaposes the existing systems used in Pakistan with the contemporary global systems and tessellates that the two are not congruent. We propose application of Holdridge life zone (HLZ) classification system in Pakistan which has not yet been determined. This opens a new outlook and helps understanding climate change in Pakistan while aligning it with the globally accepted uniform system. There is no single classification system in Pakistan that could be regarded as universally accepted. Previous classifications have done to fulfill specific objectives. It is accepted that three key factors of HLZ have to be taken into account to reach a meaningful interpretation of climate viz a viz vegetation i.e. T_Bio, P_Ann and PET ratio. In this paper a new biome map of Pakistan at 0.5° Spatial resolution has been extracted based on HLZ model. We investigated 38 worldwide classes and acknowledge the existence of 26 in Pakistan including 5 classes from the Tropical Zones. We find that the extracted map is in line with the ground reality as well as the previous studies done on the subject. This study opens up a new era to empirically capture impacts of climate change on shifts in vegetation zones of Pakistan. HLZ provides an opportunity for spatial modeling of the climate change influence on vegetation pattern.

Key words: Life zone, Climate change, Forest type