Climate Change and Variability: Producers\u27 Perceptions and Determinants of Adaptation Strategies in Rice Farming in Chitwan, Nepal

Nepalese agriculture is highly vulnerable to climate change. Rice is the most important cereal crop (as a staple food) in terms of area cultivated each year in Nepal. This study analyzes rice producers’ perceptions of climate change, its impacts on rice farming, and factors influencing the adoption of adaptation strategies of the producers. The analysis of survey data of 359 rice-producing households in the South-Central Terai region of Nepal indicated that rice producers perceived changes in local weather patterns as compared to the past year. Trend analysis (1981-2018) of weather data (temperature and rainfall) from a local meteorological station strongly supports producers’ perceptions. Results revealed that producers are adopting a number of adaptation strategies to reduce the impacts of climate change in rice farming, they were adjustment in crop calendar (72.9%), varietal selection (64.9%), investment in improved irrigation (60.7%), adoption of integrated pest management (22.1%), and adoption of direct-seeded rice (15.6%). Results indicated that 76.6% of producers were adopting at least one adaptation strategy, and 10% of producers were adopting all those five strategies. Lack of adequate information, limited technical know-how, and credit constraints are major factors that impede adaptation to climate change. Results indicates that the average rice yield of adopters was 227 Kilogram/Hectare higher than that of non-adapters. A multivariate probit model (MVP) and an ordered probit model (OPM) were used to examine factors influencing the rate of adoption of adaptation strategies and to estimate drivers of the intensity of adoption, respectively. Results of a multivariate probit model revealed complementarities among adaptation strategies indicating their adoption is inter-related. This result has important policy implications that enhancement of one strategy can have spillover effects on other strategies. Results revealed that human capital formation through education, literacy programs, formal and informal training help in making a better farming decision, increase awareness about the impacts of climate change, and can further enhance adoption of adaptation strategies on rice farming. Results of the intensity of adoption indicated that male headed household, education, awareness about climate change, use of Extension, training, and information are significant to improve intensity of adoption

Three Essays Evaluating Long-Term Agricultural Projections

This dissertation consists of three essays that evaluate long-term agricultural projections. The first essay focus on evaluating Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) baseline projection of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) mandatory farm and nutrition programs. The second essay examine USDA soybean ending stock projections, and the third essay investigate impact of macroeconomic assumptions on USDA’s baseline farm income projections. The three essays are summarized as follows: Essay1: AnEvaluation of Congressional Budget Office’s Baseline Projections of USDA Mandatory Farm and Nutrition Programs.The CBO projections of USDA’s mandatory farm and nutrition program outlays play a vital role in shaping agricultural policy and in agricultural policy debates. Using CBO projections and observed outcomes from 1985 through 2020, we examine the degree to which projections of farm, supplemental nutrition assistance, and child nutrition program outlays are unbiased, efficient, and informative. We find that projections for farm program and child nutrition program outlays are unbiased. Supplemental nutrition assistance program outlays are unbiased at short horizons but are downward bias beyond a three-year horizon. We find that all three series of projections are inefficient. The projections for supplemental nutrition assistance program and child nutrition program outlays are informative up to a five-year projection horizon, but the farm program outlay projections are informative for only a one-year horizon. Disaggregated farm program outlay projections since 2008 further suggest that the uninformativeness principally stems from conservation program projections. The findings may provide valuable insights for CBO to improve future projections and for projection users, including policymakers, to adjust expectations and future Farm Bill discussions. Essay 2: Evaluation of USDA’s soybean ending stock baseline projection.The carryover inventory of a specific commodity – ending stock, which summarizes a commodity market’s supply and demand components – is an important measure of level of scarcity in a market. Using USDA baseline projections and realized values from 1997 through 2020, we examine bias and informativeness of soybean ending stock projection. We decompose soybean ending stock projection errors using a machine learning algorithm, Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost). Our results indicate that soybean ending stock projections are unbiased (except for nowcast), however ending stock projections are informative for only one-year horizon. The decomposition of ending stock projection indicates that demand components (crushing, seed and residual, and exports) are primary sources of ending stock projection error for a majority of projection horizons. US soybean market is directly linked with global soybean import and exports, thus, we further investigate USDA projection of soybean export and import country-by-country. Results indicate that USDA’s foreign soybean import projections are barely informative for most of countries including China whereas export projection from Argentina, Brazil, and Other South American countries are informative for four years, two years, and not informative at all, respectively, under our conservative estimates. Finally, an analysis of US soybean export projection error to foreign export/import destinations indicates that errors on export projection from Brazil and other South American Countries (except Argentina) cost USDA the most. Results may help market participants form expectation when making plan and business decisions

Maternal satisfaction regarding perinatal care and influencing factors in tertiary hospitals of western, Nepal

Satisfaction has been widely recognized as an important indicator to evaluate health care quality and to provide patient centered care. The study was carried out to assess satisfaction level from a hospital based perinatal care. A descriptive cross sectional study was carried out among 428 postnatal women in two tertiary hospitals of western Nepal via structured interview schedule. Maternal satisfaction was measured by 25 item scale. Overall 45.1% of mothers were satisfied with the perinatal care. The level of satisfaction in public hospital (mean 3.44±0.65 out of 5) was greater as compared to private hospital (mean 3.27±0.59 out of 5). The satisfaction score was lower in the physical environment (mean 3.01±0.87 out of 5) and highest in privacy maintained (mean 4.37±0.92 out of 5). Determinants of satisfaction were type of hospital, religion, education, parity, number of living children, mode of delivery, gestational age at birth, maternal condition after delivery, newborn health condition, and duration of stay at the hospital and the gender of the provider (p [Med-Science 2017; 6(3.000): 471-5

Investment in Wheat Research in Nepal – An Empirical Analysis

Investment in wheat research in Nepal has been examined through estimation of full time equivalent of researchers on the basis of their time spent on wheat crop research. The information about full time equivalent was collected through questionnaire survey of the researchers involved in various disciplines of wheat research. The research investment has been compared with production share in value-terms using congruency model in the major production domains, such as development regions, eco-zones and environments. The model comparing actual production share with full time equivalent of researchers has revealed a moderately low congruency percentage indicating discrepancies in research investment across production domains. On adjusting the production share with both research progress and equity factors at the same time, the congruency percentage increased in production environments and decreased in ecozones and geographic regions, highlighting the mismatch in research investments. Some policy measures have been suggested to mitigate the mismatch in resource allocations to wheat research in Nepal

Effects of anthropogenic and ecological factors on Himalayan goral in Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve, Nepal

The Himalayan goral (Naemorhedus goral) is facing threats, such as habitat degradation and human disturbances, which are increasing. To aid their conservation, it is crucial to understand the anthropogenic and ecological factors that influence Himalayan goral occurrence. We conducted a study in Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve, Nepal using remote cameras to detect Himalayan gorals during late winter (March 2022) and spring (May 2022). Himalayan gorals were more likely to be detected in late winter (p = 0.253 ± 0.064) compared to spring (p = 0.187 ± 0.056) and the effects of anthropogenic and ecological factors on Himalayan gorals varied between these periods. During late winter, the distance to the nearest human settlement (βsettlement = 1.971 ± 1.147) and the number of other wild ungulates detected (βungulates = 2.954 ± 1.193) had a positive effect on Himalayan goral occurrence. In contrast, only the number of wild ungulate detections (βungulates = 3.262 ± 1.292) had a positive impact on Himalayan goral occupancy during spring. The number of livestock and carnivores detected during each season did not influence Himalayan goral occupancy. Our results highlight the importance of considering ecological and anthropogenic variables in understanding occupancy and distribution of Himalayan gorals to inform species conservation strategies

Spatio-temporal patterns of human-wildlife conflicts and effectiveness of mitigation in Shuklaphanta National Park, Nepal.

Human-wildlife interactions occur where human and wildlife coexist and share common resources including food or shelter. Increasing wildlife populations within protected areas also can increase interactions with humans living adjacent to these areas, resulting in conflicts including human casualty, livestock depredation, crop damage, and property loss. We analyzed six years human-wildlife conflict data from 2016-2021 in the buffer zone of Shuklaphanta National Park and conducted questionnaire survey to investigate factors influencing human-wildlife conflicts. Nineteen people were attacked by wildlife, primarily wild boar (Sus scrofa). Ninety-two livestock were killed by leopard (Panthera pardus), and among these most were sheep or goats killed near ShNP during summer. Crops were most frequently damaged by Asian elephants (Elephas maximus), followed by wild boar. Greatest economic losses were from damage to rice, followed by sugarcane and wheat. Asian elephant was the only reported species to cause structural damage to property (e.g., homes). Majority of respondents (83%) considered that the mitigation techniques that are currently in practice are effective to reduce the conflicts. However, the effectiveness of the mitigation techniques are the species specific, we recommend use of more efficacious deterrents (e.g., electric fencing) for large herbivores and mesh wire fencing with partially buried in the ground. Effective collaboration among different tiers of government, non-governmental organizations, civil societies and affected communities are important to share the best practices and continue to apply innovative methods for impactful mitigation of human-wildlife conflicts in the region

Factors influencing Chinese pangolin (Manis pentadactyla) burrow selection in the Chandragiri-Champadevi hills of Kathmandu Valley, Nepal

The Chinese pangolin (Manis pentadactyla) confronts challenges from illegal hunting, trading, and habitat degradation. Therefore, it is imperative to establish and implement effective conservation strategies at both local and regional levels. However, there is limited information, particularly within the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, underscoring the significance of local-level habitat characterization for burrowing animals like pangolins. In this context, our study aimed to assess how anthropogenic and environmental factors influence the presence of Chinese pangolins along the elevational gradients of Chandragiri-Champadevi Hills, renowned for the scenic beauty and popular hiking trails within the valley. We conducted surveys of foraging and resting burrows at 72 plots distributed along 12 elevational line transects from 1500 to 2100 m elevational gradients of Chandragiri-Champadevi Hills. Notably, we observed pangolin burrows spanning from 1550 m to 2095 m. With increasing elevation, we recorded a decline in both foraging and resting burrow numbers. Furthermore, our findings indicated an increase in burrow numbers with increasing the distances from roads, whereas burrow numbers decreased with increasing proximity to human settlements. Interestingly, foraging burrows exhibited an increase with noise but a decrease with slope, while resting burrows showed an increase association with higher canopy and ground cover percentages. Our study shows the substantial anthropogenic disturbances in the habitats of Chinese pangolins in the Chandragiri-Champadevi Hills. We recommend managing the human-associated threats to ensure the species conservation at this site-specific area

Landslide Susceptibility Assessment in Nepal’s Chure Region: A Geospatial Analysis

The Chure Hills, already vulnerable due to their fragile nature, face increased landslide risk, prompting the need for reliable susceptibility assessment. This study uses Poisson regression modeling to assess landslide susceptibility in two highly susceptible districts of the Chure region. Variance inflation factor (VIF) tests were conducted to ensure robustness, indicating no multicollinearity among the variables. Subsequently, Poisson regression analysis identified eight significant variables, among which geology, lineament density, elevation, relief, slope, rainfall, solar radiance, and land cover types emerged as important factors associated with landslide count. The analysis revealed that higher lineament density and slope were associated with lower landslide counts, indicating potential stabilizing geological and topographical influences. The categorical variable, namely geology, revealed that middle Siwalik, upper Siwalik, and quaternary geological formations were associated with lower landslide counts than lower Siwalik. Land cover types, including areas under forest, shrubland, grassland, agricultural land, water bodies, and bare ground, had a substantial significant positive association with landslide count. The generated susceptibility map that exhibited a substantial portion (23.32% in Dang and 5.22% in Surkhet) of the study area fell within the very-high-susceptibility categories, indicating pronounced landslide susceptibility in the Dang and Surkhet districts of the Chure hills. This study offers valuable insights into landslide vulnerability in the Chure region, serving as a foundation for informed decision-making, disaster risk reduction strategies, and sustainable land-use and developmental policy planning

Demographic and social information of respondents (n = 300) living adjacent (<500 m) and distant (≥ 500 m) to Shuklaphanta National Park, Nepal.

Parameters include age (years), gender (male or female), education (educated represents people who attended school through grade five or above; uneducated did not attend school), agriculture-based livelihood (people whose primary vocation is agriculture), family size (number of people), and livestock owned (number of all hoofed livestock owned). Values in parentheses are ranges.</p

Estimated value of reported crop damage (in USD) by wildlife, Shuklaphanta National Park, Nepal, 2016–2021.

Estimated value of reported crop damage (in USD) by wildlife, Shuklaphanta National Park, Nepal, 2016–2021.</p