Carbon balance and climate change in boreal forests

Most scientists agree that the global climate is changing as a consequence of humancaused perturbations to global biogeochemical cycles, especially the carbon cycle (IPCC 2001a). In addition, the impacts of these changes are becoming increasingly evident (IPCC 2001b). The boreal forest biome is one of the Earth’s ecosystems most affected by the changing climate (IPCC 2001a; Gitay et al. 2001). The forests in this 799