ANNOUNCEMENTS
Homestead gardening plays an important role to ensure balance and harmony in the ecosystem while providing several ecosystem services to its users. As majority of the beneficiaries are inattentive and unaware of the salient benefits received from these gardens, the traditional practices have been disappearing. To highlight the plethora of benefits (direct and indirect) that the homestead gardens provide, this study conducts the economic valuation of species found in the homestead garden in Kamrup (Metro.) District of Assam. Further, to bring change in the communities, a socio-cultural valuation is undertaken to understand how perception impacts current land use behaviour, and alternative ways of altering land-use. Perception analysis ranks the ecosystem services in the order of their relative importance as regulatory services (0.95), cultural services (0.93), provisional services (0.89) and supporting services (0.87). A regression analysis is also undertaken to indicate how socio-demographic factors impact and alter perception, keeping other things constant. A key result is that women as compared to men are more likely to perceive a higher value for provisional services. A contradiction in the results for control variables size of land for agriculture, and agriculture as primary occupation, with Cultural Services is found. The results of the present study are substantiated with field insights gathered during primary survey and stakeholder consultation. There exists scope of policy intervention in the field of income and livelihood generation, empowerment of women, enhancing biodiversity through motivation to preserve local and endangered species of plants, and through training and capacity development of individuals.
Key words: Homestead Gardening, Economic Valuation, Socio-cultural Valuation, Ecosystem Services, Agroforestry, Sustainable Land use Practice,
JEL Classification: O13, O440, Q510, Q570, R2
