Climate Change Adaptation for
Livestock Smallholders in Gandaki
River Basin, Nepal
Dr. Nir Krakauer
Department of Civil Engineering / NOAA-CREST,
City College of New York
nkrakauer@ccny.cuny.edu
Tarendra Lakhankar (CCNY)
Soni Pradhanang (Hunter)
Ajay Jha (CSU)
B Situation
Overstocked and unproductive livestock
Frequent droughts & declining c
Poverty
Increasing water scarcity, with women & children being the worst affected
Extreme events such as flooding
Purpose and Objectives
Purpose: Developing an integrated approach for climate
adaptation for the rural poor (focusing on livestock sector)
based on natural resource conservation and resilience
building.
Objectives:
1.
2.
3.
Understand local and regional climate change over recent
decades through application of statistical methods to weather
station and remote sensing data;
Assess the impact of past/present climate variability and
change on the health and food supply of livestock raised by
small farmers and herders across elevation gradients in
Gandaki River Basin (GRB) through field survey; and
Work with and train village-based networks to devise and
pilot strategies to increase resilience to climate hazards.
Study Area
Central Nepal
(wide range of
elevations)
Projected warming in GRB
Greater warming projected at higher
elevations
Projected precipitation change
Precipitation generally projected to increase, with
complex spatial pattern
Climate vulnerability: drought
Climate vulnerability: flood
Integrated climate adaptation
Combine climate
science with
development and
capacity building
work
Livestock adaptation strategies
Focus on nutrition,
soil/water management
for sustainable, climateresilient productivity
Project activities
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Climate Hazard Mapping
Stakeholders Meetings/Workshops
Pilots Village Based Nutritional Fodder Production and
Water Management Demonstration
Research Grant/ Internship to Graduate Students
Training of Communities on CCA
Surveys of Livestock Smallholders
Researcher/Stakeholder/Students Training
1. Climate Hazard Mapping


Analyze spacetime trends in precipitation
extremes
Initial work (submitted for publication):
Seek to synthesize station observations with
precipitation products:
–
TRMM: every 3 hours, 0.25°, since 1998
–
PERSIANN: 3 hours, 0.04°, 2006-2010
–
APHRODITE: daily, 0.25°, 1951-2007
(interpolated surface obs)
Nepal topography and stations
Precipitation distribution
Remote sensing:
TRMM
Gridded obs:
APHRODITE
PERSIAN
N
Distribution compared to stations
By elevation
By month
(dominated by
summer monsoon)
Initial conclusions


TRMM product (but not PERSIANN)
reasonably captures variability of monthly
precipitation, suitable for analyzing droughts
Need to extend to daily/hourly level to study
flood events
2. Stakeholder Meetings/Workshops
A.
•
•
•
District Level Consultation
Workshops
Dhading-30 October 2012
Syanja-31 October 2012
Kapilvastu- 1 November 2012
B. Inception Workshop
•
Kathmandu-2 November 2012
2. Stakeholder Meetings/Workshops
C. District Level Stakeholder Meetings
•
Dhading-14 February 2013
•
Syanja-16 February 2013
•
Kapilvastu- 18 February 2013
D. VDC Level Consultation Workshops
•
Dhading
•
Baireni VDC
•
Nilakantha VDC
•
Syanja
•
Tindobate VDC
•
Setidovan VDC
•
Chapakot VDC
•
Kapilvastu
•
Jayanagar VDC
•
Banganga VDC
•
Hariharpur VDC
3. Pilot Nutritional Fodder Production and
Water Management Demonstrations
3 demonstration sites at different elevations testing irrigated
nutritional fodder production, compost
Baireni, Dhading,
Jholpe, Syanja,
Gorusinghe, Kapilvastu
Weather stations at demo sites


T, q, P measured
automatically
and available on
Web
Permit
correlation with
measured yields
and livestock
health
4. Graduate Student Research
– Saluna Pokhrel: Tickborne disease in cows
– Rachana Dev: Gender perspective on livestock sector
climate change adaptation
– Razan Malla: Drip vs. flood irrigation yields, water and
nutrient use efficiency
– Parashuram Bhandari: Community adaptation to climate
extremes
5. Training Communities for Climate
Change Adaptation
Training on making hay, silage, mineral block, urea molasses
•
Dhading, Syanja, Kapilvastu
6. Surveys of Livestock Smallholders
Baseline Surveys
16-20 May 2013
7. Training of Researchers/Officials/Students
Remote Sensing and Climate Hazard Mapping
27-31 May, Kathmandu
(Octave-centric)
More Trainings for Second and Third Year
Thank You