National forest carbon harvesting and allocation dataset for the period 2003 to 2018

Combining the tree cover loss dataset, the interannual variation of the satellite-based vegetation index, and the provincial statistical harvested wood provided by the China Forestry and Grassland Statistical Yearbook, we produced a Long-term HarvEst and Allocation of Forest Biomass (LEAF) dataset for China, which provides spatial information on forest harvesting at a resolution of 30 m. Averaged from 2003 to 2018, forest harvesting took away 68.34 Mt C yr^-1. The validation results demonstrated the accuracy and reliability of the dataset in capturing the spatial variation of harvested carbon. The file format of the product is GeoTIFF with the spatial reference of WGS84 (EPSG:4326). Each GeoTIFF file represents annual harvested forest carbon (unit: g C m⁻²yr^-1), the absolute harvested carbon per pixel is obtained by multiplying by the corresponding pixel area. The excel provides the harvested carbon allocated to the different pools annually as well as the carbon dynamics, which have been updated to 2022. The dataset generated by this study is an important data source for estimating the carbon budget of forest ecosystems in China, which also can provide essential insights for sustainable forest management and climate change mitigation efforts.

本研究整合森林覆盖损失数据集、卫星基植被指数的年际变化序列，以及《中国林业和草原统计年鉴》提供的省级统计采伐木材数据，构建了针对中国区域的森林生物量长期估算与分配（Long-term HarvEst and Allocation of Forest Biomass, LEAF）数据集，该数据集以30米分辨率提供森林采伐的空间分布信息。2003至2018年的年均森林采伐碳排放通量为68.34 Mt C yr⁻¹。验证结果表明，本数据集能够准确捕捉采伐碳排放的空间分布特征，具备良好的精度与可靠性。该数据集产品的文件格式为GeoTIFF，空间参考系采用WGS84（EPSG:4326）。单个GeoTIFF文件对应年度森林采伐碳通量（单位：g C m⁻² yr⁻¹），单像素的绝对采伐碳储量可通过乘以对应像素的面积计算得到。配套Excel文件提供了每年分配至不同碳库的采伐碳数据以及碳动态变化序列，数据更新至2022年。本研究生成的LEAF数据集是估算中国森林生态系统碳收支的重要数据来源，同时可为森林可持续经营与气候变化减缓工作提供关键科学参考。