Abstract:
Chamarajanagar, one of the under-developed districts of Karnataka, lies in the rainshadow
region of the western ghats and this region with a predominant dryland
(Ahmad, et al., 2017) rural landscape– characterized by low rainfall and low waterholding
capacity of soils, had supported livelihoods traditionally through rainfed
agriculture and associated rural trades. With the advent of the green revolution in
post-independent India, the agrarian transition from dry grain complex to high-input
commercial farming (Kumar, et al., 2020) has been increasing the vulnerability of this
drought-susceptible region through privatized and extractive practices of land and
water such as deep aquifer drilling, monocropping, chemical fertilizers and
pesticides, water-intensive crops, and quarrying. These practices have been
degrading the landscape by way of depleting water-table, poor waste management,
and pollution of surface water and soil. In the climate-change context, marginal
communities that make up a sizeable portion of the demography are increasingly
vulnerable to drought and flood risks threatening livelihoods and food security. The
increasing landcover area of long-term water-intensive commercial crops and the
resultant habitat degradation also put the ecosystem stability at risk, meaning the
biota, which would have further implications on the above-mentioned human
communities and their livelihoods.
A micro-watershed of the Suvarnavathi river basin as a typical example of the
dryland region is examined. This thesis attempts at understanding the study region
within the framework of landscape ecology through precedent works in the areas of
spatial planning at the landscape scale (Selman, 2012), patch-corridor-matrix model
studies (Forman, 1995; Dramstad, et al., 1996) to document the changes, issues,
gaps, and through a landscape approach (Sayer, et al., 2013) to identify the
dynamics- multiple scales, functionalities, and stakeholders. The data collection
methods used were traverse survey, stakeholder interviews, focus group
discussions, GIS mapping, and soil and water quality tests of samples from the study
area. This vision is to work towards developing landscape management strategies at
the farm level and guidelines for community-managed resources to revive landscape
health and socio-ecological resilience.
