Baseflow persistence and magnitude in oil palm, logged and primary tropical rainforest catchments in Malaysian Borneo: implications for water management under climate change

Abstract

While timber harvesting has plateaued, repeat-logging and conversion into plantations (especially oil palm) are still active in the tropics. The associated hydrological impacts especially pertaining to enhanced runoff, flood, and erosion have been well-studied, but little attention has been given to water resource availability in the humid tropics. In the light of the increasing climate extremes, this paper compared baseflow values and baseflow recession constants (K) between headwater catchments of five differing land-uses in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, namely primary forest (PF), old growth/virgin jungle reserve (VJR), twice-logged forest with 22 years regeneration (LF2), multiple-logged forest with 8 years regeneration (LF3), and oil palm plantation (OP).