Gaining forests but losing ground: A GIS evaluation in a Himalayan watershed |
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Authors: | Hans Schreier Sandra Brown Margaret Schmidt Pravakar Shah Bubhan Shrestha Gopal Nakarmi Khagendra Subba Susanne Wymann |
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Affiliation: | (1) Resource Management Sciences, University of British Columbia, V6T 1Z3 Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada;(2) Mountain Resource Management Project International Centre for Integrated, Mountain Development (ICIMOD), GPO Box 3226, Kathmandu, Nepal;(3) Institute of Geography, University of Bern, 12 Hallerstrasse, 3012 Bern, Switzerland |
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Abstract: | GIS overlay techniques were used to provide a quantitative historic documentation of deforestation and land-use dynamics in the Middle Mountains of Nepal between 1947 and 1990. Deforestation was most critical in the 1960s, but active afforestation programs in the 1980s have reversed the process. In spite of these trends, the degradation problem is more complex. The GIS evaluation showed that 86% of the recently afforested land is now under pine plantations located primarily at lower elevations and moderately steep slopes. In contrast, rainfed agricultural expansion is most pronounced on acidic soils and steeper, upper elevation sites, suggesting marginalization of agriculture. Agricultural expansion coupled with major losses of grazing land to pine forests are the key processes pointing towards major animal feed deficits. An alternative animal feed source is suggested through GIS using a topographically based microclimatic classification to generate a tree-planting map where the optimum ecological conditions for selective native fodder tree species are identified. |
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Keywords: | Himalayas Deforestation Watershed GIS |
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