Observed and Perceived Climate Change Analysis in the Terai Region, Nepal

Abstract

Climate change will modify temperature and precipitation patterns, which could challenges the farmers for crop production in the coming days. While scientific studies regarding climate change patterns are essential to find out the impacts in regards to how the threats are perceived by local people. This paper intends to determine the extent to which climate change has caused spatial-temporal changes in temperature and precipitation that occurs on annual time scales in the Kailali, Chitwan, and Rautahat district of Nepal. Three focus indigenous groups (Chepang, Tharu, and Musahar) and a total number of 180 house- holds were interviewed during the field visit. While a secondary data were collected from the Department of hydrology and meteorology (DHM), Nepal. Mann-Kendall and Sen’s estimator of slope test were used to detect possible temperature and precipitation trend and its magnitude respectively. The findings of the study showed that the trend of minimum and maximum mean temperatures indicate significantly increased at 5 stations of three districts. Similarly, the precipitation of the post monsoon seasons is increasing at 6 stations of three districts. However, pre-monsoon, monsoon, and winter precipitation have the significant decrease at three districts stations. These finding results were verified with the people’s perception. This study could be used for the formulation of effective adaptation plan and policy of climate change in this region as well as applicable to other related areas.




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