Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is an international non-profit, multi-stakeholder organization established in 1993 to promote responsible management of the world’s forests. FSC offers a comprehensive set of universally applicable requirements for responsible forest management with its  10 Principles and 56 associated Criteria. Achieving FSC can be further divided into standard setting, independent certification and labeling of forest products. There are three types of FSC certifications. They are FM, CoC and Group Certification. Forest managers or owners who want to prove that their forest operation are socially beneficial and managed in an environmentally appropriate and economically viable manner can apply for forest management (FM) certification. FSC chain of custody traces FSC certified timber throughout the production chain.

Teak is listed as a super luxury timber in Sri Lanka and it has a high demand from construction and furniture industries. Teak hardwood is highly durable. It is an exotic species and, almost all teak plantations are located in dry and intermediate zones of the country. There are about 35,000 ha of teak plantations and most of these plantations are managed by the Forest Department. These plantations are distributed throughout many administrative districts in the country. Despite of its importance as a high-demand species in the market, there have been limited or no research studies conducted to assess the wood quality of teak grown in different districts.

Teak is an important tree species grown under plantation conditions for timber requirement. Being a deciduous tree, it favours for accelerated nutrient cycling. A field experiment was conducted in an eighteen year old teak plantation at Forest College and Research Institute, Mettupalayam, Tamil Nadu, India to study the litterfall, their composition and rate of decomposition. The litter collected were separated into leaf litter, flowers, fruits and twigs. All were subjected to decomposition by using nylon bag technique. The total annual litterfall accounted for 11,255 kg ha-1. Of the total litter, leaf fall in a year was 9216 kg ha-1 (81.9%) followed by 726 kg ha-1 (6.5 %) by twigs, 707 kg ha-1 (6.3 %) by fruits and 607 kg ha-1 (5.3 %) by the flowers. Among the litter components, flowers decomposed rapidly than the other components. The highest decomposition constant (K) was recorded for flowers (2.39) and the least for fruits (0.70). The per cent remaining of the absolute amount of dry matter of leaf litter, flowers, fruits and twigs after one year of decomposition was 17.3, 9.2, 49.5 and 19.6, respectively.

Regional Research Station, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, India

The study was conducted to compare the biomass accumulation and carbon stocks among rubber, teak and mahogany. Above Ground Biomass of each species were calculated using the allometric models. Mean total tree height of rubber, teak and mahogany were ranging from 0.87 m to 20.32 m, 3.41 m to 11.05 m and 1.65 m to 7.53 m, respectively, between 1 to 10 years of age. For height and age, regression logistic standard curves were fitted to teak, rubber and mahogany with the R2 of 0.845, 0.916 and 0.921 respectively. The mean dbh of rubber, teak and mahogany were varying from 2.19 cm to 19.63 cm, 1.97 cm to 12.84 cm and 1.75 cm to 8.14 cm, respectively, within the selected age series. Exponential curves for rubber (R2=0.976) and teak (R2=0.915) and logistic curve for mahogany (R2=0.913) were fitted for dbh vs. age. Mean total tree biomass and carbon stock in rubber were significantly higher from other two species in all selected age series, except first year; biomass and carbon stock varying 0.89 kg/tree to 262.61 kg/tree and 0.45 kg/tree to 131.30 kg/tree, respectively. For other two species, it was ranged from 0.74 kg/tree to 88.87 kg/tree and 0.37 kg/tree to 44.35 kg/tree for teak and 0.49 kg/tree to 23.83 kg/ tree and 0.24 kg/tree to 11.91 kg/tree for mahogany. For Biomass and age regression logistic, critical exponential and exponential standard curves were fitted to rubber (R2=0.965), mahogany (R2=0.862) and teak (R2=0.874). The relationship of Height vs. dbh showed a high degree of association for rubber (R2=0.918), teak (R2=0.859) and mahogany (R2=0.976). Moreover, the relationship of biomass vs. height recorded a high degree of association for rubber (R2=0.911), teak (R2=0.862) and mahogany (R2=0.962).

N. Appuhamy1, L. Samarappuli2 and S. Karunaratne1

Tropical forests are a major sink for carbon dioxide produced globally. Estimation of above-groundbiomass of these forests is an essential aspect of studies of carbon stocks and the effects of carbonsequestration on the global carbon balance. Long term monitoring plots across several tropical dryevergreen forests in India, in the recent past, shows they are highly carbon dense ranging from 73.06 Mg ha-1 to 173.1 Mg ha1. In Sri Lankan forests, biomass estimates are confined to the wet zone forests and plantations.

To assess the carbon dynamics in Sri Lankan dry zone forests, as a pilot study, above-ground biomass in five dry zone forests were estimated using past forest inventory data from 1961. Our objective was to develop an above-ground carbon database for dry zone forests, which can be used to determine the

Mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla) is an exotic tree, which is heavily adapted to the climatic conditions of wet and intermediate zones of Sri Lanka. Although the state sector manages mahogany with longer rotations, private sector expects to achieve the maximum timber yield within a shorter period. Due to the land scarcity, many of these mahogany plantations have been established in barren and rubber uprooted lands which were heavily degraded. Therefore the soil conditions and site factors directly affect the growth of the mahogany within short rotations.