Sabkha Ecosystems Volume III: Africa and Southern Europe
This book is part of the Sabkha Ecosystems series. The series is designed to provide information on sabkha ecosystems of different regions. It will add to the collective knowledge available about saline ecosystems and also focuses on the African region wh
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Tasks for Vegetation Science 46 SERIES EDITOR H. Lieth, University of Osnabrück, Germany
For other titles published in this series, go to www.springer.com/series/6613
M. Öztürk · Benno Böer Hans-Jörg Barth · Siegmar-Walter Breckle Miguel Clüsener-Godt · M. Ajmal Khan Editors
Sabkha Ecosystems Volume III: Africa and Southern Europe
Editors Prof. M. Öztürk Ege University Fen Fakultesi A Blok Botany Department E Blok 35100 Bornova, Izmir Turkey [email protected] Benno Böer UNESCO Office Doha Qatar Hans-Jörg Barth Department of Physical Geography University of Regensburg Regensburg Germany hans-joerg.barth@geographie. uni-regensburg.de
Siegmar-Walter Breckle University of Bielefeld Department of Ecology Wasserfuhr 24-26 D-33619 Bielefeld Germany [email protected] Miguel Clüsener-Godt Acting Chief, Ecological Sciences & Biodiversity Section Division of Ecological and Earth Sciences UNESCO 1 rue Miollis F-75732 PARIS Cedex 15 France [email protected] M. Ajmal Khan University of Karachi Institute of Sustainable Halophyte Utilization 75270 Karachi Pakistan [email protected]
ISBN 978-90-481-9672-2 e-ISBN 978-90-481-9673-9 DOI 10.1007/978-90-481-9673-9 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011 No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)
Foreword
Africa is one of UNESCO’s priorities. This has a lot to do with the availability of critical resources that are absolutely essential for the daily livelihood, or shall we say, survival of families, such as drinking water, fuel and food. It has also to do with the availability and accessibility of scientific knowledge as well as education, both of which are critical factors for empowering people to enhance their living standards and escape the trap of poverty. The Sabkha Ecosystem series deals with the globally important scientific problem of how to utilise abundant saline soils and water for fodder and food production, and is consistent with science-based ecosystem management. Sabkha – the Arabic term for flat salt deserts, a term which has been accepted by multi-disciplinary scientists – occur globally in abundance, especially in the northern and southern dry desert belts. These areas are hundreds of thousands of square kilometres in size, and people make little use of them for agricultural production due in part to their excessive salinity. On the one hand this is good, because it allows for these geologically interesting ecosystems to remain largely untouched. They do actually have an ecosystem function and biodiversity value, even though they may a
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