Paper Title
Climate Change Impacts on Hydrological Regime and Local Livelihood in Kaligandaki River Basin North of Nepal
Abstract
Experience has shown that even relatively small catchments have a wide variety of physical, management and policy issues relating to process hydrology, water law and policy, water resources management and stakeholder participation that can be solved in an integrated manner (HELP, 2000). In this context, some activities related to HELP (Hydrology for the Environment, Life and Policy) are initiated in Upper Kaligandaki river basin of Nepal. It is found that there are growing concerns on worsening livelihoods in the basin that are added by climate variability. Importantly, the climate change is altering frequency of snowfall and depth (amount) of snowfall which resulted less water available for irrigations and for traditional agro-pastoral production systems. River sediment and river flows found satisfactorily correlated. This is an indication that with extreme events, hydro hazards, depleting permafrost areas and glacier melts have close links with river flows and sediment. Several villages settled on the river bank and slopes are likely to disappear within the next few decades in climate continue changing at present rate. Overall scenario of the basin is that livelihoods are vulnerable and settlement began shifting.
Keywords- Kaligandaki, Agro-pastoral, livelihoods, climate Change, river sediment, HELP.