Search

Climate change is one of the most critical socio-economic and environmental problems in India. Although India's per capita emission is very low compared to other developed nations, the economic impacts are very high as millions depend on climate sensitive sectors for instance, agriculture and forestry etc. Given the above context, this paper discusses the status of climate change, its economic impacts, especially for agriculture and forestry, climate change and financial gaps and other climate policy initiatives in India. In addition, this paper also discusses the four aspects such as climate change and macro-economic impacts, distributional aspects, social cost of carbon, and finally finance and technological aspects. There arises an urgent requirement to conduct a vulnerability assessment for reducing future poverty and inequality associate to climate change in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past few decades have seen significant changes in the governance of forests in India. The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Rights on Forest) Act (FRA), 2006, was a landmark act passed in the Indian Parliament to assign individual property rights over forest resources that have been de facto used by local communities. This paper examines whether the assignment of individual property rights results in positive outcomes for forest conservation using village-level forest patta (forest land title) and census data from Bankura district in West Bengal. Vegetation Continuous Fields data has been used to measure the change in forest cover from 2006 to 2012. The results show that the percentage of forest patta land in the village, distance to markets, the existence of pucca roads, and the presence of forest protection committees (FPCs) are negatively and significantly related to forest degradation, implying improvement in forest conservation outcomes. The presence of tribal people, a larger population, and higher literacy rate are positively associated with forest degradation, meaning that they have an undesirable impact on forest conservation outcomes. The findings of this study strongly suggest that the assignment of individual property rights to both the Scheduled Tribes (STs) living in the forest and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (OTFDs) under the FRA, 2006, tends to improve forest conservation outcomes. Hence, it is suggested that the distribution of individual forest rights (IFRs) under the FRA may further improve forest conservation outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Restrictions on the collection of forest products to preserve the natural environment often affect the livelihood of forest‐fringe dwellers. This paper is an attempt to evaluate the existing and potential livelihood opportunities of the forest dwellers who use various forest products for daily consumption in the regions surrounded by Simlipal National Park in India. The study uses Herfindahl–Hirschman Index to score livelihood diversification at the household level. A regression analysis was used to determine the key factors responsible for livelihood diversification. Women of Simlipal have a high potential to manage forest resources along with their daily household chores. But their efforts are undermined and their work often remains unpaid. The present study explores how empowerment of women in terms of both access and control over resources might add to livelihood diversification. With the help of a strength‐weakness‐opportunity‐threat analysis, the study establishes if the strength and opportunities of women are focused in a positive direction through gender‐inclusive development policies, then women's involvement would support livelihood, and also in maintaining ecological integrity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessing land use and land cover change as well as monitoring dynamic nature of forest cover plays an important role for the management of biodiversity and its native ecosystem. The present paper mainly focuses on the impact of master plan on dynamicity and resilience of Adina Deer Park since 1990–2017 using multi-temporal LANDSAT data. Supervised pixel and object oriented techniques and change detection method have been used for both pre (1990–2015) and post (2015–2017) master plan. Landscape metrics have also been analyzed to detect forest fragmentation applying fragstats software. Overall accuracies for both classified images of 2010 and 2017 were 81.25% and 84.12%. The forest cover changes map exhibits that dense forest and water bodies increased from 15.68 to 39.64 ha and 8.12 to 9.17 ha whereas sparse forest and bare land declined from 31.02 to 22.08 ha and 22.59 to 9.11 ha respectively. The result showed a significant increase in dense forestand sparse forest with annual growth rate of 20% and 15.97% after the implementation of master plan in 2015. This study may assist the planners and policy makers to adopt the environmental and ecological oriented strategies for sustainable management of ecosystems and biodiversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the impact of property rights legislation on the political participation of Scheduled Tribes (STs) - an indigenous community of India. The legislation recognised forest land rights of STs who had been historically residing over forests without formal land titles. Utilising administrative data on land titles, we show that increased demand for land titles increases the political participation of STs as election candidates. This increase is on account of new political candidates that are contested by non-mainstream political parties. We provide evidence that incomplete implementation, that raises but does not meet expectations, is the mechanism. In particular, land title applications that are rejected by sub-district/district-level authorities are driving this increase. Our results suggest that land titling legislations can encourage marginalised beneficiary groups to use political participation as a means to establish their land rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land emerged as a critical element to understand India's new urban transition and development-dispossession debate since it adopted the globalization policies in 1991. The land grab and land-based accumulation have been widely studied in leading cities in the backdrop of the neoliberal urban process. The relatively smaller, medium-sized cities contribute to comprehending this process's sub-regional and local variants. In this paper, we study Siliguri, a rapidly growing city in West Bengal, a federal state that was a major epicenter of the country's land debates in the recent past. Land is relatively scarce in Siliguri due to its location in the narrow land strip, India's strategically important 'Chicken-Neck Corridor.' The land is also diverse, including tea plantations, defense, and forested land, protected through various legal arrangements. The growing demand-supply gap and land price speculation led to an emerging new political economy. At the local level, new legal and extra-legal mechanisms have taken care of alternative routes of land-based accumulation ranging from land liberalization, commodification, new enclosures, and land grabbing, which are orchestrated by the local business class, tea lobby with an ineffective legal state, land mafia, and shadow state agencies. All these suggest a complex, variegated land accumulation under a rapid urban transition process that marginalizes the indigenous landowning community and tribal population in the region. • Land-based accumulation is critical to understanding urban transformation in the global south and India. • Medium-sized cities contribute to the regional and local variants of land accumulation and urban transformation processes. • The demand and scarcity of land emerged a new political economy- involving the state, business class, and land mafia. • The legal and extra-legal mechanisms operated variegated accumulation strategies, marginalizing the weaker segments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to survey the literature and factual evidence on the nexus between deforestation and agriculture through an assessment of the potential impacts of climate change in the context of the world, India, and the Western Ghats. The Western Ghats region was chosen for this study because of its deep ecological significance. A few underlying themes were created and findings were documented under each theme that ranged from the causes of deforestation, the transformation of forest land for agriculture, the nexus between agriculture, deforestation and climate change, climate-driven agricultural vulnerability and the reconciliation of forest protection with agriculture. These findings suggest that shifting agriculture has been a dominant source of deforestation. The primary climatic impacts on agriculture are seen through crop yield falls. India's arid and semiarid tropical regions have witnessed high climate-driven agricultural sensitivity. This could be on account of the fact that India's tropical forests have witnessed high deforestation. The presence of higher tree densities in areas under Joint Forest Planning and Management in the Western Ghats create the potential for sparing remaining land areas for non-forest uses such as agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biological invasion not only depends on the environmental characteristics of any region but also on the fundamental characteristics of the invader species. Assessment of plant performance across diverse habitats and altitudinal gradients provide insights into the traits contributing to invasion success in addition to its habitat suitability, susceptibility and mechanisms adopted by the plant. As the environmental conditions of similar habitat types vary within short distance in mountainous landscapes, the present study was conducted with aim to understand the morphological and functional trait variations in a notorious invasive weed Ageratina adenophora along the altitudinal gradient in Kumaun Himalaya, India. The results revealed that due to higher plasticity in the plant traits, this weed can take advantage of available invasion windows. Morphological traits i.e. plant height (SL), root length (RL), above and belowground biomass (AGB and BGB), number of leaves (LN), branches (BN) and capitula (CN); functional traits i.e. root:shoot ratio (R:S ratio), root weight ratio (RWR), stem weight ratio (SWR), leaf weight ratio (LWR), inflorescence weight ratio (IWR) etc.; and seed output along an altitudinal gradient explained the invasion success of A. adenophora in diverse habitats. Plasticity of plant traits in diverse habitats signifies the strategies that assisted A. adenophora to become a successful invasive species. Higher biomass allocation to shoots favors speedy increase in plant height, an approach adopted by most of the plants for sunlight harvesting. Across the altitudes, healthier plant performance was recorded at mid altitudinal ranges (1000–2000 m a.s.l.), and among the habitats, good performance of A. adenophora in streamline, wasteland, wall and road-side populations in comparison to forest and cultivated land indicated vulnerability and further spread of A. adenophora in these habitats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large-scale tree planting has been advocated for decades in many countries as a cost-effective strategy to mitigate carbon, rejuvenate degraded landscapes, and support local livelihoods. Recent studies, however, suggest limited ecological and livelihood impacts of tree planting programs, indicating possible limits to tree planting as a natural climate solution. In this paper, we explore these carrying capacity-like limits by evaluating the site suitability of forestry landscapes of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh using theory/expert-based rules and machine learning algorithms. We find that the state can only achieve a maximum of 31.54% forest cover due to socio-ecological and biophysical constraints, much less than India's goal of bringing 66% of the total geographical area of Himalayan states into forest cover. The low availability of suitable lands for growing trees, together with poor plantation site selection by forest range officers limit the use of tree planting as a sole climate mitigation strategy. To approach theoretical planting limits, we propose an ePSA (e-Plantation Site Assistant) recommendation system based on our site-suitability results to assist forest rangers in selecting suitable sites for planting trees. An initial deployment of the recommender system suggests its potential utility in shaping the long-term success of tree plantations as an effective carbon strategy in northern India and beyond. Overall, we argue that there is a need to realign over-ambitious national and international tree planting targets with actual limits from site characteristics to avoid massive wastage of funds and to obtain feasible carbon mitigation outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An experiment was conducted during 2016–2017 to evaluate phosphate fixation and release behavior in Alfisols of West Bengal, India under 5 prevailing land use systems viz., Fallowland, Forestland, Upland, Mediumland and Lowland, of the locality. Ten levels of Phosphorus (P) (through KH2PO4) were applied to the duly processed soil samples and incubated at room temperature (30 °C) for 96 hours after which the available soil P was estimated by Olsen's method. The P fixing capacity of the soils was then calculated. The effect of application of 2 levels of silicon (calcium silicate) (0 and 50 kg ha−1) and 2 levels of organic manure (FYM) (0 and 7.5 t ha−1) on P dynamics of these soils over a period of 120 days was also studied in a pot culture incubation experiment in Bidhan Chandra Krishi Vishwavidyalaya (BCKV), Mohanpur, Nadia, West Bengal. While the highest P fixation (75.01%) was observed under Forest land, the lowest was observed under Medium land (54.49%). The observed results indicated that P content of soil, irrespective of land use, increased by a whopping 125.89% up to 30 days of incubation and then started declining. Application of silicon and FYM resulted in significant increase (P < 0.05) in the available P content of the soil and silicon and organic manure had a synergistic effect increasing the available P throughout the incubation period. We conclude and recommend application of silicon and organic manure for increasing availability of P in these traditionally high P fixing Alfisols of West Bengal, India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aggregate-associated soil organic carbon (SOC) controls organic carbon stabilization. The research question of this paper was: what were the effects of conversion of forest land uses to agriculture at Ranchi, India on SOC pools, soil aggregation and aggregate-associated C? The samples were taken from six different land uses viz. native forest (NF), agri-horticulture (AH), native grass land (NG), rice-wheat (RW), rice- vegetable (RV) and maize-wheat (MW) from three soil depths (0–15, 15–30 and 30–45 cm). Soil aggregation, SOC pools and aggregate-associated C were determined. Results revealed that SOC concentration in NF was 36%, 67% and 127% higher than RW, RV and MW land uses, respectively, at 0–15 cm depth. The microbial biomass carbon (MBC) was higher in NF land uses than rice-based systems in the soil surface (0–15 cm) due to less disturbance. In surface soils (0–15 cm depth) under NF, the large macroaggregates had 21% and 40% higher SOC concentration than RW and RV, respectively. Similarly, NF soil had larger small macroaggregate-associated C than RW, RV and MW systems in the 0–15 and 15–30 cm layers. This result supports that tillage and regular crop removal under arable (MW, RW and RV) systems adversely affect loss of SOC contents in the surface layers and C storage inside aggregates, both in the 0–15 and 15–30 cm soil layers at Ranchi, India. • Conversion of native forest (NF) to rice-wheat (RW) system reduced total C by 36%. • Large macroaggregates of NF had ~21% and 40% higher total C than RW system. • RW system had higher C than rice-maize (RM) in the surface (0–15 cm) soils. • NF and grassed soils had higher soil aggregation and macroaggregates than RW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land uses are pivotal in global carbon cycles. The native forest lands possess a greater potential to sequester higher carbon, which can directly address soil quality and climate change problems. Unfortunately, the rapid conversion of forests to other land use over the past few decades has significantly declined the concentration of carbon in the soils. Therefore, in order to estimate the impact of land-use change (LUC) on soil carbon status, this present study was attempted under major ecosystems (Forest (FOR), cropland (CRP), tea plantation (TEA)) of Conoor. Results from findings revealed that total organic carbon (TOC) concentration and carbon pools were significantly (p<0.05) higher in FOR than in CRP and TEA. TOC (0-45 cm) recorded in FOR, CRP and TEA was 32.88, 11.87 and 18.84 g kg-1 and it decreased along the depth increment. Carbon stock (t ha-1) in FOR, CRP and TEA (0-45cm) was 68.10, 26.04, 42.42. Microbial biomass carbon (MBC) was higher in FOR (283.08 mg kg-1) followed by TEA (94.64 mg kg-1) and CRP (76.22 mg kg-1). The microbial biomass nitrogen (MBN) followed; FOR > TEA > CRP. These results clearly indicate that the LUC has inflicted a greater impact on soil carbon status and its extent was quantified using the land degradation index (LDI). The LDI (0-45 cm) recorded in CRP (-38.65) and TEA (-61.75) signals the need for immediate implementation of carbon management strategies in the CRP and TEA ecosystem to keep the soils of Conoor alive and prevent land degradation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article illuminates the patterns and processes of institutional work during the creation and implementation of the FRA 2006, even as state agencies consistently resist changes in legal institutions, and continue to retain control over forestry matters through non-statutory institutions - a strategy to subvert local people's control over the valued forest resources.The study demonstrates how 'institutional work' proceeded through different stages of drafting of the Act, revolving around competing demands of entitlements, leading to creation of a new institutional mechanism. Although non-state actors such as civil society organisations were actively engaged in crafting the law, their role has weakened as implementation has progressed. The state's increasing activity frustrates reform implementation, as the reforms challenge the foresters' bureaucratic culture and threaten their politico-economic interests. It concludes with insights for theoretical understanding on how and why institutions change, or are maintained, in case of multi-actor and multi-layered forest governance systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in the nature of vegetation imply changes in land surface parameters such as surface albedo, roughness length, root depth, and surface emissivity which results in alteration of land surface conditions. This study aims to understand the effect of enhanced forest conditions on land surface states and land surface fluxes over central India during different seasons. In this study, the following simulations were carried out using Noah3.6 Land Surface Model (LSM) in Land Information System (LIS) for 5 years from May 2013 to May 2018 over the Indian region: (i) Control (Ctl) run, that represents the cropland(normal) scenario with Modis IGBP land cover map, (ii) Experimental (Exp) run, that represents enhanced forest conditions, where the cropland cover was replaced by evergreen broadleaf forest over the targeted region (central India). The results of this study indicate that when the model outputs were averaged over the targeted region, enhanced forest conditions led to increased soil moisture content as compared to the Cropland scenario due to dense cover of the surface and higher water holding capacity of the soil. Due to the canopy interception of solar radiation and increased soil moisture availability in the Exp-run, a decrease in both soil temperature and daily soil temperature range was seen as compared to Ctl-run. Net surface radiation increased during all the seasons in Exp-run as compared to Ctl-run due to a decrease of surface albedo. On conversion from cropland to the evergreen broadleaf forest, an increase in the latent heat flux was observed during all the seasons due to an increase in soil moisture and an increase in surface roughness length. A reduction in the sensible heat flux was observed during the post-monsoon season and beginning of winter season, however, for other seasons, an increase in the sensible heat flux was seen. The above behavior of sensible heat flux is due to variation of precipitation and the varying absorbed surface energy during different seasons. Furthermore, the results suggest that the effect of this enhanced forest conditions on land surface characteristics is more pronounced during the drier periods. A similar behavior of land surface characteristics due to enhanced forest conditions is observed for all the seasons during different years from 2013 to 2018. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human-wildlife conflicts are typically treated as emergent dilemmas related to wildlife management and anthropogenic encroachment into forest land. However, conflict events are rarely discrete, localized phenomena with direct cause-effect relationships, and a better understanding of how historic changes in social and cultural practices and politico-economic decisions impact human-nature relationships would lend greater insights into the development and unfolding of conflict events. We employ a political ecology framework to investigate the case of human-Rhesus macaque conflict in Himachal Pradesh, northern India, to show that human-rhesus macaque interactions originate in structural changes in the region's socio-economic systems because of global and national economic policies that have shaped the ecological stability of the region. Our analysis highlights that human-wildlife conflict needs to be examined as a complex interplay of multiple competing factors ranging in scale from the global to the local. It is therefore imperative that any strategy to mitigate human-wildlife conflict must account for the socio-ecological-economic stability of the region wherein the interaction occurs rather than merely addressing the visible cause of the conflict event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The forest fires is one of the most dangerous disasters to the livelihood planet of earth. Human intervention into the field of the destruction of nature is another cause of these forest fires. The ability to heal nature is dampened due to the expansion of human territories into forests causing loss of lands for the forests. While human expansion cannot be halted, so we as human must take a responsibility for the consequences and make sure the climatic changes due to such disasters, should be as low as possible. Halting the forest fires is an impossible task, and the best we can do control the fires and the amount of area burnt. This process can be improved by predicting the forest fires and the amount of area that might get burnt due to the predicted fire and take measures against it such that there would be no fire at all or the very least reduce the amount of area burnt during the fire. Machine learning in predictions of forest fires is heavily researched and mostly used in real-time. Though usage of machine learning algorithms has been in use, the accuracy of these models is of the lower levels. The paper introduces using a model which is a hybrid of its predecessors, taking as many postulates from them as possible and leaving the cons behind. The hybrid model which is a combination of support vector machine and random forest regression model is using the data of forest fires in the period of 2011–2020 in India, and able to give more accurate predictions. The proposed RVFR model also results in achieving an accuracy of 94%, which is greater than all of the predecessors and with a variance of 1.0. • Provides an extensive survey for finding the distribution related to the forest fire data used for predictions. • Provide comparative analysis of existing models implemented using random forests, support vector machine, etc. • Proposed an algorithm– Random Vector Forest Regression (RVFR) Model for optimal results in predicting the forest fire • The results demonstrated an accuracy of 94% with the proposed RVFR model which is greater than all of the predecessors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The variability of soil qualities across the coffee‐growing areas and consequences of conversion of forest to coffee plantations on soil qualities and sustainability in the Western Ghats of South India are evaluated in this study by assessing and studying the six representative pedons selected from Chikmagalur district in Karnataka and Wayanad and Idukki districts of Kerala taking into consideration of the agro‐ecological zones, they belong. Sixty sites were located for monitoring soil quality, of which 46 sites were located in coffee plantations of all agro‐climates and 14 in forests adjacent to coffee plantations in similar setting. Soil quality indicators were selected by carrying out principal component analysis (PCA) on measured soil attributes, which provided 4 PCs in both land uses with eigen values > 1 and explaining at least 5 per cent variance in data set. The indicators for coffee land use were pH, exch. Al and CEC and for forest land use, organic carbon, pH and exch. Al. These indicators were transformed into scores following linear scoring method and soil quality index was determined, on a scale of 0–1, using the weighting factors obtained from PCA. Soil quality index was high (0.836) for natural forest land use, while it was medium (0.634) for coffee land use. Results indicated that organic carbon, pH and exch. Al are the most powerful indicators of soil quality. Proper management of soil acidity in coffee plantations due to liming, pooling back of nutrients, fertilization effect and other anthropogenic interventions in them have helped in maintaining a near equal soil quality to that of natural forest, which can be made sustainable by adopting effective plantation management practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fundamental resources of environment for instance, land, water and air which support life on this planet earth. These resources are the home of incalculable natural frameworks which are self supporting organizations of plant and animal domains. Individual is just a piece of the climate as another animal yet in light of his control over development he has had the choice to become master of the universe through and through, this regard of various life structures which have the world. This haughtiness of mechanical power has made outrageous natural agitating impacts and destruction which has unsafe signs for the perseverance of people themselves. For quite a while, basic normal resources like land, water and woodlands have been controlled and used with everything taken into account by town networks appropriately ensuring a viable use of these boundless resources. The outrageous change in resource control and the ascent of critical conflicts over ordinary resources is used by non-close by factors was connected with pioneer dominance of this region of the planet. Outskirts dominance methodically changed the typical essential resources in to products for making advantages and advancement of salaries. The essential present day insurrection was for the most part maintained by this difference in focus in to things, which permitted European endeavors permission to the resources of South Africa. The difference in focus in to products has two consequences, first, it denies The politically more weak get-together of their qualification to get through which they had through induction to focus, second it ropes from nature its doing great to self restoration and reason ability by clearing out the social obliges on resource use that is the reason of ordinary property the board. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New species of Cestrum fasiculatum (Schltdl.) Miers complex from the eastern India, Cestrum benghalensis sp. nov. described and depicted. Its specimens were found in the Herbarium of Botanical Survey of India (CAL) in material collected in 1965 by H. Santanu and S.K. Mukherjee, which was collected from Chilapata forest, Rissum, West Bengal and is referred to the Flora of Bengal and Borders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]