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Change in forest and vegetation cover influencing distribution and uses of plants in the Kailash Sacred Landscape, Nepal

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Abstract

The study of vegetation and land-use change has been frequently used to assess the anthropogenic impacts on the distribution and uses of medicinal plant species. Using data from ecological investigations, remote sensing and participant observations, the nexus of socioeconomy, forest management and conservation of medicinal plants can be analyzed. In the current study, we employed a similar approach to study the impact of forest and vegetation cover, socioeconomic changes on plant distribution and use in remote and rural districts of Nepal. We have used remote-sensing data to analyze the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Leaf Area Index (LAI) as proxies to analyze the changes in forest cover and vegetation. Informant interviews and group discussions were held with local participants to assess their opinion about the uses and distribution of plants, forests and vegetation. While the overall vegetation cover was decreasing, a fluctuated pattern was recorded with a reduction in NDVI from 2000 to 2008, and subsequent increase after that. A positive correlation between LAI and NDVI was found, but the index varied spatially and temporally and sometimes was negatively correlated as NDVI saturated and became insensitive. Due to decreasing old-growth primary forests, land-use changes, and increasing sociocultural transformations, we found that the tradition of transhumance and collection of indigenous medicinal plants were rapidly being changed and the non-indigenous plants were increasingly being collected from the accessible forest areas and human-derived landscapes. These changes help us conclude that the salient sites and species are being assimilated in the local traditions; making traditional systems more versatile, diverse and adaptive.

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Acknowledgements

This study was partially funded by endowment fund of WLBC, Missouri Botanical Garden, Garden Club of America, Anne S. Chatham Fellowship (2012-3), USA, and Rufford Small Grant Foundation (21198-2), UK. We are thankful to Sanjay Tiwari for his field supports. Faisal Mueen Qamer, Gokarna Thapa, Kamal Humagain, Yogendra Karna are acknowledged for their supports in analyses of data. The authors are grateful to local communities for their supports for data collection, and John Metz, Keshab Bhattarai and Maria Fadiman for critical feedback on earlier manuscripts. The thorough reviews by the anonymous reviewers were useful for improving the paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geosciences, Florida Atlantic University, 777 Glades Road, Boca Raton, FL, 33431, USA

    Ripu M. Kunwar & Aaron Evans

  2. Portland State University, Portland, OR, 97207, USA

    Janardan Mainali

  3. UNDP Climate Change Program, Jumla, Nepal

    Abdul S. Ansari

  4. Institute of Remote Sensing and Digital Earth, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Haidian, Beijing, China

    Bhagawat Rimal

  5. Saving Knowledge, Casilla 13092, La Paz, Bolivia

    Rainer W. Bussmann

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  1. Ripu M. Kunwar
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RMK designed study, carried out field work and prepared draft. RMK and ASA carried out field work. AE, BR and JM analyzed geospatial data. AE and RWB edited drafts and contributed statistical analyses.

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Correspondence to Ripu M. Kunwar.

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Kunwar, R.M., Evans, A., Mainali, J. et al. Change in forest and vegetation cover influencing distribution and uses of plants in the Kailash Sacred Landscape, Nepal. Environ Dev Sustain 22, 1397–1412 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-018-0254-4

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