Climate Change in the Himalaya region

Recent studies focus attention on the radically changed flood patterns, including heavy rainfall that leads to landslides and soil erosion. For example, in Nepal women and men have noted increased frequency and damage caused by the floods over a twenty-year time-span (Gautam et al., (2007). During floods, rivers may cut into agricultural land, inundate crops or wash the fields away in their entirety. Economically poor and marginalised households are affected because they often only have access to marginalised land, such as that which is close to rivers and more acutely prone to flooding. Many rural farmers depend solely on natural resources for their survival and therefore, changes in monsoon patterns have devastating effects on their livelihoods and agricultural and pastoral practices.