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Despite the critical importance of mountain forests, vulnerability assessments often fail to integrate the collective understanding of the ecological conditions of the forests and the social aspects of global climate change in many sensitive regions. The Himalayan mountain range is one such example, where forests and communities depending on forests should be seen as part of an integrated socio-ecological system while assessing impacts of climate change and other anthropogenic pressures in the region. Acknowledging the association of communities with forests, and their awareness and knowledge on climate change phenomena can assist policy-makers to shape better adaptation and mitigation initiatives, with more situation-specific and location-specific contexts. With this background, the present study attempted to understand forest cover changes in the central Himalayan region (Kumaon region of Uttarakhand state), to both anthropogenic pressures causing forest loss in the past and climate change likely to alter the potential distribution of forests in the future. The study further evaluated variations among forest-adjacent households in identified vulnerable regions to assess the dependency of local communities based on different forest types. The study also examined the perceptions of local communities related to climate change impacts in their surroundings. Based on a multi-disciplinary approach, this study has two broad objectives: (i) to identify the changes in forest distribution (past anthropogenic disturbances and future climatic changes), and (ii) to know the importance of forests and perceived climate change impacts among local communities.
The first objective developed detailed temporal forest cover database for the study region using a tree-based ensemble classification approach. To further understand mechanisms causing forest cover change, the study assessed components of forest fragmentation to see changes in type, as well as, density of forests in the study region. And finally, the study assessed climate change impacts on geographically dominant and ecologically important forest tree species, which are likely to shift/migrate in potential future climate scenarios. This allowed identification of vulnerable areas in the study region, which were later used as a reference for the subsequent objective.
The second objective involved assessment of forest resource dependency among local communities, along with their perceptions on observations related to climate change impacts. To achieve this objective, the villages in the study region were selected based on their proximity to the dominant forest type. The results indicate that although local communities recognize the vulnerability to climate change impacts, it varies significantly based on their nearest forest type, in this case, oak-dominated forests or pine-dominated forests.
The doctoral research work provides a critical overview of vulnerability of forests due to impacts of climate change, and their subsequent effects on forest-dependent people in the study region. The integrated approach allowed generation of information which will eventually ensure management and conservation of the Himalayan forests in future. This will benefit the forest-dependent communities by meeting their present day needs, while at the same time, allowing opportunities to secure continued availability and contribution to the long-term development of forests in the Himalayan region. The developed methodological approach and understanding through this research can be further extrapolated to other mountain systems, especially in the Hindu-Kush Himalayan (HKH) region.
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