Climate change is playing havoc with farming and people’s lives in Uttarakhand

Climate change is as detrimental to human life as Corona, though not as quickly. The former is more of a silent killer but its effects are far-reaching and irreversible. It is slowly, but steadily, impacting the lives of people in the hills of Uttarakhand. Its first victim, of course, is the agriculture and those involved in farming. The hill State, with an agricultural population of around 71 per cent, is going to be the worst hit in the years to come. The latest study by Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and The Tata Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) has drawn a scary picture for the beautiful mountainous State. It has revealed that Uttarakhand’s temperature would change as much as 1.90 by 2050. This change may look insignificant, yet it will have a major impact on the environment and the lives of people. As per the 2011 census, 40 per cent of Uttarakhand’s total population has already migrated to the plains. The farmers in large number are abandoning their traditional vocation, farming. According to a 2018 survey, 734 villages in the State are uninhabited since 2011. The number of such villages, often called “ghost villages”, and the rate of migration will only increase.

As most people in Uttarakhand depend upon agriculture for a living, the effect on their livelihood would be severe. Climate change would dent agriculture the most. As per the study, high evaporation due to rising temperature would increase “water stress”, leading to floods and changes in crop yields. The Almora, Champawat, Pauri and Tehri regions are going to be the worst hit. The rise in temperature will make various crops unviable and the farmers would have to give them up altogether. It might take a few decades, but its impact is already visible in the hills. Many farming families are finding it difficult to survive as their yield per acre is going down and the traditional crops don’t grow anymore. Floods have also become frequent in the hills. Unfortunately, hardly anything is being done to arrest climate change. Steps should have been taken to stop deforestation and construction activity, besides sops given to farmers. But nothing is happening on the ground. The Government is in fact abetting the building of dams amid the fragile ecosystem, which would only add to nature’s fury. It is about time that some policy changes were introduced and implemented to avert an impending disaster.