eChapters

Introduction
 
Safety is one of the first, and most important, things to consider when we decide to apply the pesticides indoors to treat or prevent a pest infestation. If proper safety measures are not followed, the outcome may be harmful or fatal. Perhaps all of us more or less aware about the fact that there is no pesticide which is “absolutely safe” to human or other non target organisms. But we may call some are safer than others.

We usually use pesticide of various kinds in and around our home. We use these products to control insects (insecticides), termites (termiticides), rodents (rodenticides), fungi (fungicides) and microbes (disinfectants).

Introduction

Almost all agricultural commodities include cereals which are stored in go-downs or store on large scale or small scale because storage of food grains is inevitable both in times of deficit and surplus production (Lal, 1985). The intensification of food production has led to several problems in the post-harvest phase including the major concern of pest infestation during storage. The post harvest losses in India have been estimated to be 12 to 16 million metric tonnes of food grains every year (Singh, 2010). The stored grain pests are serious pests of dried, stored, durable agricultural commodities and of many value-added food products and non-food derivatives of agricultural products worldwide.

Introduction

Among vertebrate pests such as birds and wild animals, Well-known rodents include mice, rats, squirrels, dogs, gerbils etc., are great importance. Among rodents, rat and mice come under class Mammalia. They are small mammals belonging to order Rodentia and under sub family Murinae in the Family Muridae. Rat and mice cause severe damage to various crops like sugarcane, rice, maize etc. both directly and indirectly by gnawing, spoilage, contamination and hoarding activities. Beside this, it is big problem in house, store godown, warehouse, urban cities and industries. Rats and mice have caused more human suffering and more economic damage than any other vertebrate pest. It is also known to introduce secondary pest like fleas, mites and ticks into premises cause additional problem.  Statisticians estimate that rats and mice destroy 20 per cent of the world’s food supply every year directly by feeding and indirectly through contamination. It has adapted to nearly all human environments. They live in granaries, fields, city sewers, attics, basements, street trees, on top of 30-story buildings, and inside subway tunnels. Rats may be also responsible for the spread of many diseases. Some of the more important diseases associated with rats are plague, murine typhus fever, rat bite fever, salmonella food poisoning, and trichinosis. Adult mice have a small, triangular head with a small nose and little delicate feet as compared to the body. The mouse ears are very large relative to their heads. Rat ears are smaller relative to their heads. Rats have thicker tails than mice.

Introduction

Insects have a long history through many geological periods. They appeared in the world long before man. Over 750,000 species of true insects have already been described, for centuries man has fought insects as pests, carriers of disease and destroyers of his food. This combat will continue, for humans have never eradicated a single species. Insects such as flies, fleas, lice and mosquitoes directly attack man and domesticated animals. Others attack indirectly by transmitting dangerous diseases to man and animals.

Introduction
 
Natural control strategies that employ biological agents for pest suppression are generally classified as biological control tactics. In conventional usage, this term usually refers to the practice of rearing and releasing natural enemies:   parasites, predators, or pathogens. A slightly broader definition of “bio-control” includes any related management activity that is designed to protect or conserve natural enemies. Biological control is the use of living organisms to maintain pest populations below damaging levels. Natural enemies of arthropods fall into three major categories: predators, parasitoids, and pathogens (Altieri et al., 2005; Mahr et al., 2008).

Introduction

The Indian lac insect, Kerria lacca (Kerr) (family Tachardiidae (Kerriidae), super family Coccoidea of the order Hemiptera) is widely cultivated in India for their products viz., resin, dye and wax.Lac products have diverse uses in food, pharmaceuticals, surface coating, electrical, cosmetic industries, etc. Lac cultivation is one of the major sources of income for the tribal community of the country. India is the global leader in lac production. Out of 2 strains (kusmi and rangeeni) available in lac insects, Kusmi lac insects are specific to India and contribute good quality and quantity lac. Although lac insects can survive on more than 400 host plants, important host plants of lac insects are Butea monosperma (Palas), Schleichera oleosa (Kusum), Ziziphus mauritania (Ber) and Flemingia semialata in India.

Introduction

Lac insects, under Family Tachardiidae (= Lacciferidae), Superfamily Coccoidea, Order Hemiptera are commercially important species for resin, dye and wax production. Lac insects are naturally distributed in tropical and subtropical areas of south and south-east Asia. Out of the nine genera and 99 species of lac insects reported from the world, two genera and 26 species are found in our country. The family Tachardiidae is divided into two sub-families, i) Tachardiinae including true lac insects of resinous cell and ii) Tachardininae including pseudo-lac insects of non-resinous cells. In India, lac is cultivated in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and parts of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and West Bengal primarily using Kerria lacca. However, natural populations of Kerria spp are distributed throughout India and K. chinensis in the north eastern states is also cultivated to a certain extent. Kerria lacca species is represented by two distinct forms, kusmi and rangeeni, differing for their host species preference, life cycle pattern, quality and quantity of the resin produced, settlement behaviour, etc. The two forms of the Indian lac insect, commonly referred as ‘strains’ in lac insect literature, were placed as infrasubspecific forms by Varshney (1977).

Introduction

Despite the predominance of attention to insects as pests, many insects are directly beneficial to humans, and as a result, mass-production methods have been developed. The most notable example is silkworms, although many other insects are mass produced for various purposes. For example, Lacewings, ladybird beetles, and some parasitoids are mass produced and sold as biological control agents against various pests. Bumble bees and alfalfa leaf cutting bees are mass produced as pollinators for greenhouse crops and alfalfa seed production, respectively. A major concern in any kind of mass rearing facility is the risk for pest and disease outbreaks. If pest and diseases are not controlled, a sudden collapse of the insect colony can occur and the quality and quantity of their product may be reduced. Sericulture is practiced by scores of farmers in the tropical, subtropical and temperate countries including India, China and other Asian countries. India produces 25,519 metric tonnes of silk and holds second position in the world in silk production (www.csb.nic.in). The Indian silk is comprised of mulberry silk produced by Bombyx mori (Insecta: Lepidoptera: Bombycidae). About 92% of India’s total raw silk production is from the mulberry silkworm. The silk produced by silkworms is known as “Queen of fibers” due to glittering luster, soft-feeling, elegance, durability and tensile properties.

Introduction
The major non-mulberry silkworms include the following

1.    Tasar silkworm Tasar silkworm is wild. Larva of tasar silkworm spins a ring like structure around the twig and a long peduncle before constructing the cocoon. Cocoons are large, thick and pedunculate. Cocoons are referred as ‘Hens’s eggs’. They are made of a single unbroken filament and hence are reelable. Tasar silkworm is bi/ tri/ tetra/ pentavoltine. This silk is brown colored silk. Monia or Mauni vessel, a palm leaved vessel is used to rear tasar silkworm in olden days.

a)    Indian Tropical Tasar, Antheraea mylitta (Saturniidae: Lepidoptera) This silkworm commonly found in tropical India. It is polyphagous and feeds on a number of food plants. Its principal host plants are asan (Terminalia tomentosa), arjun (T.arjuna) and Sal (Shorea robusta). Secondarily it feeds on Ber (Zizyphus sp.) The cocoons are grey white, tough and pedunculate.

Introduction

The word ‘Sericulture’ is derived from the Greek word ‘sericos’ meaning ‘silk’ and the English ‘culture’ meaning ‘rearing’. It refers to the mass scale rearing of silkworm for obtaining silk from them. Mulberry sericulture involves production of silk using mulberry as the host plant. Silk is known as Resham in Hindi, Soie in French, Seide in German, Seda in Spanish, Seta in Italian, Tsi in Chinese, Soi in Korean, Knu in Japanese, Solk in Russian etc. It is regarded the queen of textiles as it is most elegant among all the  textile fibers with unparalleled grandeur, natural sheen, inherent affinity for dyes, high absorbance, light weight with soft touch and high durability.

Introduction

All living organisms are subject to infestation or attack by their natural enemies and honeybees of the genus Apis are no exception. Through their long history of evolution by natural selection, they have achieved a high level of eusociality; many thousands of individual bees living together in a tightly knit social organization. Since individual bees have more than frequent content among themselves, and trophallaxis is one of the most important aspects of the bee’s social behaviour in that it allows hormones and pheromones to be widely distributed throughout the colony whenever pathogenic organism is present in the colony it will be spread with great ease. Honeybee diseases create serious problems, which must be met not only by the bee-keeper but also by the bees themselves.

Introduction

In India importance of beekeeping is for honey production and little importance has till now been given to the primary biological and economic role played by bees in the pollination of agricultural crops. Honeybees are most fascinating creatures on the earth. They provide not only honey and also other valuable beehive products such as bees wax, pollen, royal jelly, propolis and bee venom. The bee forage in good quality is the primary requirement for production of the beehive products whereas efficient management and manipulation of bee colonies can competent for more production. A wise beekeeper adjusts to colony manipulation techniques according to floral and climatic conditions. In temperate regions there is enough flora during particular period i.e. spring and summer of the year and bees collect and store food but they face protracted dearth period in winter. Under subtropical climate of the country, nectar and pollen sources are available for most part of the year which are helpful for production of beehive products with quality.

Introduction

India is a vast country with varied agro-climatic condition favor the growth of wild variety of natural and cultivated flora. The extensive area of forest and millions of acres of cultivated land sustains a large proportion of insects and honey bees (Thakar 1976). The honey bees are social creatures and taught us how we should live and cooperate with each other in the society. People have a high regard for honeybees for their carefulness, unity, sacrifice, tolerance, cooperation, coordination, division of labour, social service and usefulness. They live in large colonies, each consisting of a queen (mother of the colony), a few hundred of drones (males) and several thousand sterile female workers.  Workers, as their name implies, do most of the work ‘work’ around the hive. India has been known as ‘land of honey’. Since centuries, honey is used to tree a diversity of illness through a wide range of applications. Honey has a long history of human consumption, and most commonly consumed in its unprocessed state (i.e. liquid, crystallized or in the comb) in our country. It is taken as medicine, eaten as food, or incorporated as an additive in a variety of food and beverages.

Natural disasters are extreme events within the earth’s system (lithosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere or atmosphere) which differs substantially from the mean, resulting in death or injury to humans, and damage or loss of valuable good, such as buildings, communication systems, agricultural land, forest, natural environment. They are a profound impact of the natural environment upon the socio-economic system (Alexander, 1993). This impact may be rapid, as in the case of earthquakes, or slow as in the case of drought. It is important to distinguish between the terms disaster and hazard. A potentially damaging phenomenon (hazard), such as an earthquake by itself is not considered a disaster when it occurs in uninhabited areas. It is called a disaster when it occurs in a populated area, and brings damage, loss or destruction. Natural disasters occur in many parts of the world, although each type of disaster is restricted to certain regions. Natural disasters are events which are caused by purely natural phenomena and bring damage to human societies (such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes). Mitigation of natural disasters can be successful only when detailed knowledge is obtained about the expected frequency, character, and magnitude of hazardous events in an area. Many types of information that are needed in natural disaster management have an important spatial component.

The District-wise weekly agroadvisory service based on medium range weather forecasting (3 to 10 days) has been made operational by the State Agricultural Universities in collaboration with National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF), India Meteorological Department. The Agroadvisory Bulletin (AAB) contains three parts. The first part of AAB consists of weather events occurred during the past week and weather forecast for three days ahead. These forecasts provide expected weather on cloud amount, rainfall, average wind speed, wind direction, maximum and minimum temperatures and cumulative rainfall. The second part contains the factual information on the varieties of crops, their state and stage, ongoing agricultural operations and occurrence of insect pest and diseases of crops.

Increasing evidences over the past few decades indicate that significant changes in climate are occurring across various regions of the globe in the form of increased occurrence of extreme weather events. The significant cause to this sustained increase in climate variability, known as climate change has been a resultant of increased level of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere. The reason for this increase is mainly ascribed to enhanced human activities such as industrialization, uncontrolled burning of fossil fuels, increased use of refrigerants and changed land use patterns and practices. Most significantly, the concentrations of GHGs like CO₂ has already crossed the 400 ppm mark, while other potential contributors like methane and nitrous oxide also show significant rise. As a result of the heat absorbing capacity of these gases, there has been a considerable rise in global mean temperatures, more so in the recent decade and more. The increase in mean air temperatures of the globe was 0.76^ºC during the past 100 years. This rate of increase has been higher during the past two decades and the recent period recorded the warmest years in sequence, the latest being the 2017.

Agricultural production in India is still vulnerable to vagaries of monsoon rainfall in spite of rapid technological advancements like 1) Availability of high yielding varieties 2) Improved crop management practices and increased irrigation availability and effective control of pests and diseases and etc, over last few decades. Majority of Indian farming community which broadly comprising of small and medium farmers are often subject to climate extremes such as droughts, floods, heavy rainfall events, heat and cold waves, frost, hail storms during the crop growing season. The probabilities of occurrence of such climate extremes and associated crop damages and production losses are common in tropical countries like India. Compensation to the resource crunched farmers in the form of crop insurance seems to be the best option for speedy recovery from the losses incurred during the season. It provides security and stability to farm income by protecting the farmers’ investment in crop production and then improves their risk bearing capacities. Crop insurance scheme is based on the fundamental principle of insurance business in which risk is distributed across space and time. For successful implementation of any crop insurance scheme operating presently in the country, proper monitoring of accurate weather parameters at the identified locations throughout the crop life cycle is important.

Climate change is a multifaceted alteration of climate which is perceptibly subtle and yet continuous, nevertheless it is extremely important due its consequences on whole biome that thrives under constant or relatively unchanged climates. The effects of climate change have reached such an extent that irreversible changes in the functioning of the planet are feared. Some of the main effects of climate change with specific reference to agriculture and food production especially during the last decade are: increased occurrence of storms and floods; increased incidence and severity of droughts and forest fires; steady spreading out of frost-free intervals and potential growing season; increased frequency of diseases and insect pest attacks; and vanishing habitats of plants and animals. Currently, the world is facing a challenge of producing sufficient food from dwindling natural resource base for the constantly increasing population.

Eastern India is frequently affected by weather hazards, such as drought, flood and heat wave. The region consists of Orissa, West Bengal, and Bihar. The coastal states of Orissa and West Bengal frequently face cyclones, while Bihar and eastern U.P. face cold wave. Due to unfavorable seasonal weather, crop productivity is poor. However, the recent change in climate induced by global warming has further threatened the agricultural productivity in the region. Rice is the principal crop of Eastern India and rice based cropping systems has long been practiced in the region. While rice-rice is the most dominant cropping system in Orissa and West Bengal, rice-wheat is in Bihar and eastern U.P. Besides, rice-groundnut occupies a considerable area in the region. It is now doubtful whether the resilience of these cropping systems would continue sustaining the productivity under the climate change. The major aim of the proposal was to identify suitable adaptation measures of crop production under projected climate change. Climate change is expected to alter precipitation pattern, increase temperature, change in humidity level and decrease sunshine. As a result it is like to influence right from land preparation to the harvest and post harvest process. Thus the project aim was to revisiting the existing package of practices of selected cropping systems by simulation modelling, deduce suitable adaptation measures and validate these by OTC experiments.

The Northeast Region (NER) of India consists of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura, covering an area of 255168 km2. The area is characterized by rich biodiversity, heavy precipitation and high seismicity. Although the contribution from agricultural sector towards gross domestic product has declined, yet it remains the predominant sector for Indian Economy. Over 75% of the people of NE India directly depend on agriculture for their livelihood. Therefore, better performance of agriculture has a direct and multiplier effect across the economy of the region. Because of climate change the rain fed agriculture is facing a greater risk as it is resource poor and having limited flexibility for adaptation. Under changing scenarios there is increase in demand for fresh water and nutrient requirement, increase in soil erosion and nutrient losses affecting soil health, intensification of pest, disease and weed problems, reduction in nutritional quality and low input use efficiency. Continuous mono-cropping and the associated excessive tillage, inadequate erosion control measures and large scale slash and burn cultivation (Jhum) resulted in significant environmental damage and a non-sustainable crop production system in the region.

Climate change and its variability imposed a great threat to agriculture production and ultimately on food security. Understanding of anomalies in climatic variables is essential to make agriculture sector resilient. Jharkhand state, geographically located at 220 28’ N – 250 30’ N latitude and 830 22’ – 870 40’ E longitude with an altitude up to 1142 m above msl and having humid to sub-humid tropical monsoon type of climate, has a number of agro-climatic/physiographic constraints. The state has 3 agroclimatic sub-zones viz; Central and North Eastern Plateau sub zone (zone IV), Western Plateau sub-zone (zone V) and South Eastern Plateau sub-zone (zone VI) falling under agroecological regions XI, XII and XIII. Zone IV is having 15 districts; Zone V has 6 and Zone VI have 3 districts. Agriculture in Jharkhand is very tedious due to topographical, physiographic and climatic constraints. Vagaries of climate put greatest limitation before the agricultural production system in the State.

Bihar’s economy is highly dominated by agriculture and allied sectors. Around 85 to 90 percent of the population still lives in rural areas, where agriculture along with animal husbandry, is the main source of their livelihood. In Bihar, the gross and net sown area is estimated at 8.26 and 5.64 million hectares, respectively. Nearly 60 per cent area under cultivation in the state is rainfed (Anon, 2008). The region comes under sub-humid subtropical monsoon climate. Most of the annual rainfall (almost 85 per cent) received from south-west monsoon, occurs during June to September (Sattar, 2010). There are three crop growing seasons in the state commonly known as kharif, rabi and zaid. The important kharif season crops, which are planted in May-June and harvested in September–October, are rice, maize, sesame, sorghum and bajra. Pigeon pea is an important long duration pulse crop sown during kharif season as sole crop or intercropped with maize. The important rabi crops which are sown in October–November and harvested in February–March are wheat, rabi maize, potato, chickpea, lentil, rapeseed, mustard, barley.

The State of Himachal Pradesh encompasses a geographical area of 55.7 lakh ha and is situated between 31°22’40" and 33°12’40"N latitude and 75°45’55" and 77°10’20"E longitude. The state is bordered by Jammu and Kashmir on the north, Punjab on the west, and Haryana on the south-west (Fig. 19.1). About 12 per cent of the state area is under agriculture which is mostly (80 per cent) rain fed. Wheat, maize, rice, and barley are the principal crops. In state, there are 12 districts, viz., Bilaspur, Chamba, Hamirpur, Kangra, Kinnaur, Kullu, Lahaul & Spiti, Mandi, Shimla, Solan, Sirmaur and Una. About 20 per cent of the area is under forest cover. It is rich in biodiversity of flora and fauna. Nearly 27 per cent of the area of the state is covered under permanent pastures. The state is endowed with a wide range of physiography/landform, climate, vegetation and geology which have influence on genesis of soils. The soils are mostly shallow, medium deep to deep, well/excessively drained, sandy, sandy-skeletal, loamy-skeletal, coarse-loamy and fine-loamy, calcareous as well as non-calcareous with low available water capacity. The State is the biggest montane ecosystem in India situated in northern part of the country. It is seventeenth largest state in terms of area and twentieth in population of which 65 per cent people are dependent on agriculture and 60 per cent of GDP comes from agriculture sector. Increasing temperature and reducing rainfall affecting the crop growth and crop production is a major issue everywhere in the world nowadays and this state has also not remained untouched by these prime issues of climate change. For sustainable development of agriculture in state, there was/is a need to identify and quantify climatic change where agriculture has a significant influence on both the economy and livelihood.

Agriculture is very intensely influenced by weather and climate. While farmers are often compliant in managing weather and annual variability, there is however a high degree of adaptation to the local climate. This may be in the form of conventional infrastructure, native agricultural practices or personal experience. Climate change an in this way be relied upon to affect the agriculture, possibly threatening established characteristics of farming systems and provide chances for improvements. The role of climate change in influencing human activities and the natural environment is all around acknowledged. This may go from an extreme event enduring just a couple of hours (i.e. hurricane, thunderstorm and showers) through to the multi-year dry spells (Maracchi et al., 2005). Increase in concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere further contribute to climate change. This results in a strong impact on human activities and natural environments. Essential areas, for example agriculture and forestry, will be more susceptible than auxiliary and tertiary segments, for example manufacturing and retailing (Parry et al., 1998).

The Jammu and Kashmir State lies in the extreme North of the Himalayas and constitutes about 67.5 per cent of the North West Himalayan region. The State is predominantly a mountainous state with all the major Himalayan ranges and trans-Himalayas adequately represented. The State of Jammu and Kashmir located in the north Western corner of India, extends between 32o-17' and of 37o-50' North parallels of latitude and 73o-26' and 80o-30' East of meridians of longitudes and 81o East of Greenwich. The State on the basis of physiography may be divided into three main regions (i) outer Himalayas which comprise of Jammu province (ii) lesser Himalayas which comprises of Kashmir Valley and (iii) inner Himalayas which comprise of Ladakh province. Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh regions have distinct agro climatic characteristics. Jammu region has two different climatic zones depending primarily on altitude. Lower hills & plains bear subtropical climate with hot dry summer lasting from April to July. The summer monsoon commences around first fortnight of July and fading away in early September.

Climate change is one of the most important global environmental challenges facing humanity and as per the instrumental records, the earth’s climate system has demonstrably changed on both global and regional scales since the preindustrial era. Further evidence shows that most of the warming (of 0.1°C per decade) observed over the last 50 years, is attributable to human activities. The levels of greenhouse gases namely carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O) have increased markedly as a result of human activities. The CO₂ concentration in atmosphere is now more than 400 ppm and the decadal increase is from 0.86 ppm per year to 1.99 ppm per year (Table 16.1) which is the highest ever. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2007) projects that the global mean temperature may increase between 1.4 and 5.8 oC by 2100. This warming of the earth-atmosphere system is expected to have severe impacts on the global hydrological system, ecosystems, sea level, crop production and related processes. Agriculture sector is the most vulnerable entity in light of the global warming and its impacts.

India, as a developing country has reasons to be concerned about the adverse impact of climate change on its economy. A large part of its population depends on climate sensitive sectors for livelihoods which makes it highly vulnerable to climate change. Climate change can have serious impact on its crops, forests, coastal regions, etc. which can in turn affect the achievement of its important national development goals. The issue of climate change cannot however be taken up without linking it to developmental needs such as poverty, health, energy access and education. Traditionally climate change experts have focused on mitigation measures, adaptation measures have also been acknowledged of late as effective and equitable means to deal with climate change impacts. Most of the mitigation measures are high in terms of technology and capital. Therefore, while developed economies choose to mitigate climate change by making heavy investments, developing economies choose to adapt (Monika and Hooda, 2018). There is increasing recognition that the world’s current progress on reducing greenhouse gas emissions is not occurring rapidly enough to avoid impacts from climate change in the coming century. Because of this, the world is “committed” to a certain level of global warming and therefore,

The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change  has confirmed that change in climate system is gradually leaving a strong impact. Observations undoubtedly show that there is increasein global temperatures, wide spread melting of snow and ice, and rising global mean sea level. Global climate has shown warming of 0.89 [0.69 to 1.08] °C over the period 1901–2012 which is mainly attributed to anthropogenic activities. Scientific findings indicate that warming is more pronounced than expected and the impact would be particularly severe in the tropical areas, which mainly consist of developing countries, including India (Shukla, 2016). Thus, climate change is a great challenge which is continuously being faced by the sustainable economic growth of the India. Climate sensitive sectors like agriculture, forestry, hydrology oriented sectors faces major threat due to projected changes in climate. India Meteorological Department (IMD) in 2012 reportedincreasing temperature trends during last 112 years and increase in heavy rainfall events and decrease in low and medium rainfall events over India.

In order to achieve maximum and sustainable crop production from available farm resources, it is essential to have proper knowledge of the agro-climatic resources of the location/region. Therefore, a thorough understanding of the climatic conditions would help in determining the suitable agricultural management practices for taking advantage of the favorable weather conditions and avoiding or minimizing risks due to adverse weather conditions. better planning of cropping pattern, developing irrigation and drainage plans for an area (Chaudhary et al. 2015). Hence, trends of temperature and rainfall are studied in this section with possible impact studies on rice production for Chhattisgarh state. Challenges of rainfed rice production can be understood through trend studies of key weather variables. Analysis of rainfall in the context of rainfed rice production in Chhattisgarh state has been carried out. Analysis has been done at Department of Agrometeorology under All India Co-ordinated Research Project (Raipur) to characterize the key weather parameters statistics.

Importance of rice in Konkan area is characterized by heavy rains of 100 mm per week or so over an extended period and contributes 42.9 % of total rice production in the Maharashtra State. Rice is the only suitable crop that can be grown under puddled soil conditions, i.e. with standing water over bunded fields. Tansplanting method of rice is commonly followed by most of the farmers in this region. Puddled rice is said to be of assistance in mitigating the effects of floods. The problem of weeds is minimal in puddled rice culture. Thus, rice serves as a livelihood crop for millions of small, and marginal farmers in Konkan who can afford only low-cost technologies. Even though the crop is robust and versatile, it has faced drawbacks in terms of low yield and reduction in acreage. In Konkan region of Maharshtra, there are two agro climatic zones viz., North Konkan coastal zone comprising three districts viz., Thane, Raigad and Greater Mumbai and South Konkan Coastal Zone comprising two districts viz., Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg. Ratnagiri district receives the highest rainfall of > 3500 mm while Thane district receives the lowest rainfall (2000-2500 mm) in this region. Sindhudurg and Raigad districts receives 3000-3500 and 2500-3000 mm rainfall, respectively.

Evidence is fast accumulating that the problem of climate change is of a scale not previously encountered by human societies. The scale and scope of climate change challenges to food and water security are unprecedented. World food supply is already facing significant pressures. Even without climate change, ensuring sufficient food for all in the 21st century would be difficult enough. Climate influences food security through many channels. Climate change will increase the severity and frequency of cyclones, flooding and drought. It will intensify rainfall variability, increasing water stress, weeds, pests, and erosion and reducing soil fertility. Above certain temperature ranges, crops develop more rapidly, resulting in lower overall grain production, even moderate increases in temperature can decrease yields in major food crops. Population growth, urbanisation, higher per capita calorie intake, and increasing consumption of meat combine to put more pressure on exiting water recourses.

The State of Andhra Pradesh in the present form came into being on June 2, 2014 as a result of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act. The state has 13 districts out of which nine are along the coast of Bay of Bengal and four are land locked in the southern part. A part of Khammam district, which is now in the Telangana state, was also added to the East and West Godavari districts of the State of Andhra Pradesh. The existing data for these two districts do not include this part and this fact is to be borne in mind. The state has a geographical area of 1.602 lakh km2 with a population of 49.83 million. The state in the current form is more agrarian compared to the undivided state as about 62 per cent of population depends on agriculture as a source of livelihood. Yet, the contribution of agriculture to the state’s gross domestic product is only 17 per cent. Though the state is known as ‘rice bowl of India’, not all is well with agriculture in the state. Some parts, especially the coastal districts, are prone to incidence of cyclones and floods while some other districts, Rayalaseema districts, are chronically drought-prone. 

The extreme weather events of the present day and the expected future climate scenarios at global and regional scales have been attributed to the changes in the atmospheric chemical composition and the massive amounts of greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitted by humans since the industrial revolution, bringing about the global warming and resulting in Climate Change. Further, the natural disasters like flash floods are attributed to the highly conspicuous human interventions with nature – the earth and its atmosphere. The parody of the situation is that, while the GHGs sourcing countries are mainly the developed ones, the sink of the result are the agrarian-dominated and eco-sensitive economies of the tropics. Invariably, tropical regions are to be affected the most, because, on the one hand the general circulation of the atmosphere directly and naturally causes divergence of the polluted air from extra tropical regions towards tropics, while on the other, the industrialization within the tropical regions too would affect the local atmosphere. Karnataka State, being located well within the tropics, can be truly impacted by the climate change caused by anthropogenic sources and it is demarcated into 10 agroclimatic zones (Fig. 9.1) based on crops, soils and climate. Climate experts have warned that Karnataka is likely to be more vulnerable to climate change than other states in India.

The State of Karnataka is located between 11.50° to 18.50° N latitudes and 74.25° to 78.50° E longitudes and covers an area of 19.1 m ha which accounts for 5.8 percent of the total geographical area (TGA) of the country. Out of the total 19.1 m Ha in Karnataka the net cultivated area (2010-11) was 10.5 M Ha, net irrigated area 3.49 m Ha and net rainfed cultivated area 7.01 m ha. Karnataka has the largest area under rain-fed agriculture (Fig. 8.1). Nearly 55% of total food grain production and 74% of oilseeds production come from rainfed agriculture in Karnataka. Therefore rain-fed agriculture plays an important role in total food grain production in the state. Further the rain-fed agriculture has substantial untapped potential, which can be brought to use by increasing the crop yields in the dry land areas through the adoption of proper dry-land production technologies. The climate of the state is determined mainly by the geographical location with respect to the Sea, monsoon winds and physiography.

Tamil Nadu has unique physiography with western and eastern Ghats on the west and northwest, Bay of Bengal in the east and Indian Ocean to the south. Tamil Nadu has high dependence on natural resources and hence faces the threat of climate change and its impacts. Available evidence shows that there is high probability of increase in the frequency and intensity of climate related natural hazards (Stephen, 2012). Out of 13 million hectares of geographical area, about 7 million hectares of land is under cultivation. Of this 55 per cent is irrigated and rest is under rain fed / dry lands. In Tamil Nadu, ground water has been harnessed fully and dry land productivity is found oscillating with ruling variability in seasonal monsoon rain and hence agricultural productivity is always under stake.

The State of Kerala has witnessed an unprecedented and unusual flood which devastated the entire State during August 2018 after the notorious 1924 flood, popularly known as the flood of 1099. Heavy rainfall from 14 to18 August 2018 led to flash floods across the State. This was aggravated by the dam opening and subsequent water level in the downstream of the rivers. 33 dams were opened across the State. This has caused the river water to flow into the inland areas. Rivers overflowed and inundated the river side villages and towns. It was reported that the water levels at many places were of the order of 20 feet. Landslides were the major threat that claimed many human lives. A chain of mud slip/land slide events took place during the heavy rainfall period at the time of flood across the mid and high lands of the State, which are ecologically sensitive areas. Even before the heavy rainfall events started on 14th August, 2018 there were major rainfall events on August 8thand 9th. On 9thAugust 2018, Nilambur (Malappuram District) recorded extremely heavy rainfall of 400 mm which is a record rainfall in 24 hours as far as the State is concerned.

Climate risk management in the semi-arid tropics (SAT) is one of the major challenges to achieving food security and development in India and large parts of sub-Saharan Africa and also in the case of Australia. Climate-induced production risk associated with the current season-to-season variability of rainfall is a major barrier in making rainfed agriculture sustainable and viable farm business. Since season outcomes are uncertain, even with the best climate information, farmers have limited flexibility in applying management with confidence. In fact in risky environments, farmers most often respond by adapting a risk averse strategy and are reluctant to invest in even risk reducing measures (Leathers and Quiggin 1991). In the SAT agro-ecologies, there are a limited range of enterprise or crop options to consider which may be further restricted by cultural traditions, food preferences or market opportunities.While there are fundamental differences between large scale commercial farms in Australia compared to the predominantly smallholder resource poor farms found in India, when it comes to climate risk management in the SAT, there are many commonalities. The purpose of this paper is therefore to (i) establish a framework for managing climate variability and transforming farming systems to be more resilient and sustainable for future climates; and (ii) provide some case study examples from climate risk management in low rainfall cropping system in Australia and consider how they may be applied in smallholder systems of the SAT.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its fifth assessment report (AR5) stated that warming of the climate system is unequivocal and is more pronounced since the 1950s. The atmosphere and oceans warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, and rise in sea level is noticed. Each of the last three decades has been successively warmer at the earth’s surface than any preceding decade since 1850 and the globally averaged combined land and ocean surface temperature data show a warming of 0.85°C over the period 1880 to 2012. The recent years viz., 2015, 2016 and 2017 were the hottest years on record. The warming trend in India since 1961 has indicated an increase of 0.9°C, which is likely to impact many crops, negatively impacting food production. There are already evidences of negative impacts on yields of wheat and paddy in northern India due to increased temperature, water stress, and reduction in number of rainy days. Coastal agriculture has the onus of providing livelihood to nearly 20 % of Indian population. The water logging and coastal salinity are the major factors affecting the agricultural output from the regions.

Food security is one of the most important issues during this century under the projected climate change scenario. The world is facing severe food crisis due to weather vagaries as a part of global warming and climate change. Many countries are under severe food crisis during the crisis of weather abnormalities since 75 per cent of world’s population is dependent on agricultural activities for their livelihood. Therefore, there is an urgent need to produce more and more foodgrains at the global as well as national levels to meet the food requirement of growing population under the projected climate change scenario. There has been a major decline in world rice production since late 2007 due to various reasons including global warming and climate change in top rice producing countries. 

Natural disasters are of meteorological or hydrometeorological origin. Disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis are occasional, but rainfall-related hazards, flood or drought, are very frequent and thus call for proper monitoring of large-scale rainfall variation, and better manage- ment and planning to combat the problem(s). Variation in rainfall is very large spatially and temporally compared to any other atmospheric parameter, such as pressure or temperature. The large temporal variability in the Indian rainfall has produced frequent flood/drought and periods of above/below normal rainfall for several centuries past. Areas of high rainfall and runoff are flooded in the summer monsoon season whereas others face water stress and drought conditions. The influence of global warming on rainfall variations over India is reported in numerous observational (Singh et al., 1991, 1992) and modelling studies (Lal, 1994). 

Climate Change has emerged as one of the most serious environmental concerns of recent times. The most imminent climatic change is increase in atmospheric temperature due to increased levels of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄), nitrous oxide (N₂O) and hydrochlorofluoro carbons (HCFCs). Because of increasing concentrations of the greenhouse gases in atmosphere, there is much concern about future changes in the climate system viz., Atmosphere, Lithosphere, Biosphere, Hydrosphere and Cryosphere. Direct or indirect effects on the society linked sectors like water, forestry, agriculture, animal agriculture, fisheries, land and marine biodiversity and health due to climate change/variability are many-fold and economic impact of climate change is enormous. The recurrent drought and desertification threaten seriously the livelihood of over 1.2 billion people who depend on land for most of their needs.

In contrast to the earlier and existing non-sustainable land use practices, agro forestry presents a more dynamic, productive and sustainable solution to the increasing demand of food, fodder, timber and other agricultural and tree goods. According to the United Nations,the world population was more than 7 billion in 2011 which is expected to go up to 9.3 billion by the mid-century. Consequently food production needs to be increased by over 60% by the year 2050. Agroforestry, which is a multifunctional, ecologically based, natural resource management system can help in dealing with such environmental, economic or social issues.

Introduction

Agriculture expanded and forest dwindled. That eventually occurred with the expansion of civilization. Clearing of forests, granted in past, continued in modern times. Cutting of forests reached to such an alarming level that thinking of people turned back to create more forests. Sometimes over extraction of forest resources made forests unstable to yield perpetually according to necessity in future for which forests are turned unsupportive for livelihood and people tried for innovative means to enhance forest productivity in future (Nair 1993). Also with time agriculture faced the similar unfortunate condition towards intensive cultivation. So, peoples’ thinking turned back in agriculture how to make it stable and more supportive for livelihood year after year. Culturally human societies are connected both with agriculture and as well as forests from the time immemorial.

Introduction

Homegardens are traditional agricultural systems, particularly common in the tropics characterized by a high plant diversity (Kumar and Nair 2004, 2006; Scales and Marsden 2008; Galluzzi et al. 2010), maintain high level of productivity, stability, sustainability and equitability (Soemarwoto and Conway 1992), serve as a refuge for wildlife (Perfecto and Vandermeer 2008), contributing significantly to the household diet by producing a large variety of food commodities (Kumar and Nair 2004; Wiersum 2006; Pulido et al. 2008; Kortright and Wakefield 2011; Kumar 2017; Kumar and Tripathi 2017), nutritional supplies (Mendez et al. 2001; Perrault and Coomes 2008; Vlkova et al. 2010; Balooni et al. 2014), supplementary cash income for owner (Huai et al. 2011; Arifin et al. 2012; Yang et al. 2014) and important spaces for transmission of cultural heritage (Galluzzi et al. 2010). Many native or endangered species can be found in homegardens (Albuquerque et al. 2005; Akinnifesi et al. 2010; Milow et al. 2013), and they are niches for domesticating semi-wild species (Akinnifesi et al. 2010). Plants grown, intentionally or unintentionally, in homegardens are important for household subsistence and economy.

Introduction

Forest cover of India has been estimated to be 7,01,673 km2 (70.17 million ha) which is 21.34 per cent of the total geographical area of the country. The tree cover of the country is estimated to be 92,572 km2 which is 2.82 per cent of geographical area. The total forest and tree cover is 7,94,245 km2 which is 24.16 per cent of the total geographical area of the country. Out of this, 9.14per cent forest cover is in the form of open forests and another 1.26 per cent is scrub forests (FSI 2015). According to National Forest Policy 1988, one-third (33.33%) of the land area should be under the forest cover for sound ecological balance. It means that we have to bring another 11.66 % area under forest cover and at the same time improve quality of the degraded forests. However the horizontal expansion of land under tree cover is not possible. In order to increase the tree cover and fulfill the requirements of the people and industries,

Introduction

The literatures and researcher data showed that there is negative impacts of agricultural expansion, landscape modification and deforestation on biodiversity, ecosystem services, alteringthe species composition and their ecological functions (Tscharntke et al. 2005; Priess et al. 2007; Flynn et al. 2009; Senior et al. 2013; Deguines et al. 2014; Kumar 2016) which can lead to considerable changes in critical ecosystem processes. On the other hand, an increasingly industrialized global economy, rapid population growth, land degradation, land use pattern and role of various human activities have led to dramatically increased the pressure on the natural resources such as the available land for sustaining the livelihoods, and with over exploitation and extraction of the natural resources the ecosystems are becoming unsustainable and fragile since last century (Kumar 2017). Standardization of cultural practices is one of the primary objectives to make the system ecologically, sustainable and economically viable (Gill et al.2009).

Introduction

Agroforestry is a land-use management system where trees or shrubs are grown around or among crops or in pasture lands. It combines agricultural and forestry technologies to create more diverse, productive, profitable, healthy, and sustainable land use systems.
India has been at the forefront of agroforestry research ever since organized research in this area started worldwide about 25 years ago. Considering the country’s unique land use, demographic, political and socio-cultural characteristics as well as its strong contributions to agricultural and forestry research, India’s experience in agroforestry research has proved important to agroforestry development especially in developing countries.

Introduction

There is a growing interest in the role of different types of land use systems in stabilizing the atmospheric CO₂ concentration and reducing the CO₂ emissions or on increasing the carbon sink of forestry and agroforestry systems. Forestry has been recognized as a means to reduce CO₂ emissions as well as enhancing carbon sinks. There is considerable interest to increase the carbon storage capacity of terrestrial vegetation through land-use practices such as afforestation, reforestation, and natural regeneration of forests, silvicultural systems and agroforestry (Brown 1996; Canadell and Raupach 2008). Agroforestry systems are very important given the area currently under agriculture, the number of people who depend on land for their livelihoods, and the need for integrating food production with environmental services (Garrity 2004; Makundi and Sathaye 2004).

Introduction

Trees play an important role in ecosystem in all terrestrials and provide a range of products and services to rural and urban people (Gogoi 2015). As natural vegetation is cut for agriculture and other types of development, the benefits that trees provide are best sustained by integrating trees into agricultural system - a practice known as agroforestry. Agroforestry focuses on the wide range of trees grown on farms and other rural areas. Among these are fertilizer trees for land regeneration, soil health and food security; fruit trees for nutrition; fodder trees for livestock; timber and energy trees for shelter and fuel wood; medicinal trees to cure diseases and trees for minor products viz. gums, resins or latex products. Many of these trees are multipurpose, providing a range of benefits. Although effective and valuable tools have been introduced to evaluate the risk to construction in areas prone to geo-hydrological hazards, fewer steps have been made in the field of ordinary land use planning at different scales. 

Introduction

The world demand for wood is continuously increasing due to increase in population. The ever increasing population has led to depletion of existing timber reserves and the forestland base has been reduced by increased allocation of forest areas to urban, agricultural, recreational and other uses. The growing awareness towards development of plantations has generated a voluminous increase in the demand for quality planting material. Conventionally, propagation is achieved through sexual (seeds) or vegetative methods (rooting of cutting, grafting, layering, etc). Propagation through seeds is routinely used for production of planting material but it generates immense genetic variability which is not desirable while propagating perennial tree species. In order to propagate selected trees with desirable features vegetative propagation methods like rooting of cuttings, grafting, layering etc have been developed. These methods can produce genetically identical off springs thereby preserving the advantageous traits;