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Geospatial Analysis of Droughts, Rice and Wheat Production, And University of Arkansas, Fayetteville ScholarWorks@UARK Theses and Dissertations 5-2016 Geospatial Analysis of Droughts, Rice and Wheat Production, and Agrarian Vulnerability: A District- Level Study of the self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index in India Aaron Michael Shew University of Arkansas, Fayetteville Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd Part of the Agronomy and Crop Sciences Commons, Climate Commons, Plant Biology Commons, and the Spatial Science Commons Recommended Citation Shew, Aaron Michael, "Geospatial Analysis of Droughts, Rice and Wheat Production, and Agrarian Vulnerability: A District-Level Study of the self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index in India" (2016). Theses and Dissertations. 1458. http://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/1458 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Geospatial Analysis of Droughts, Rice and Wheat Production, and Agrarian Vulnerability: A District-Level Study of the self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index in India A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Geography By Aaron Michael Shew Middle Tennessee State University Bachelor of Science in International Relations, 2011 Bachelor of Arts in Global Studies, 2011 May 2016 University of Arkansas This thesis is approved for recommendation to the Graduate Council. _____________________________________ Dr. Thomas R. Paradise Thesis Director _____________________________________ ____________________________________ Dr. Lawton L. Nalley Dr. Fiona M. Davidson Committee Member Committee Member _____________________________________ ____________________________________ Dr. Stephen K. Boss Dr. Kenneth L. Kvamme Committee Member Committee Member ABSTRACT Droughts have affected more people than any other natural disaster in the last century, causing billions in economic damages and millions of deaths. As the Sea Surface Temperatures (SST) have heated in the Indian Ocean, drought patterns across South Asia have changed; the Indian monsoon has become more volatile and less predictable. In this study, monthly self- calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index (sc-PDSI) data for the time period between 1950 and 2009 were interpolated to India’s districts; then the data were analyzed for changes in frequency and severity. The data were further evaluated using Anselin’s Local Moran’s I Statistic to elicit the spatial autocorrelation of droughts by decade from 1950 to 2009. This analysis showed the concentration of droughts in certain regions of India relative to others for each decade. Droughts in the 2000-2009 time period were particularly concentrated and severe over the Gangetic Plains, one of the primary regions for agricultural production. After analyzing drought patterns in India, data for rice and wheat production between 1998 and 2009 were collected for each district. Then, an Ordinary Least Squares regression was used to analyze the metric tonnes (MT) of production per hectare per district and the total hectares planted in each district with annual sc-PDSI data and locational fixed effects by state for both rice and wheat. The MT per hectare measured each districts production efficiency during drought, while the hectares planted was used to proxy producer decision-making during a drought year. Droughts, as estimated by sc-PDSI, were significant at the P < 0.01 level for all four regressions: 1) MT per hectare of rice; 2) hectares planted to rice; 3) MT per hectare of wheat; and 4) hectares planted to wheat. The results suggest that during drought years, rice production is reduced by 0.04 MT per hectare (~2%), but wheat production increases by 0.02 MT per hectare (~3%). Conversely, districts planted an average of 2,210 more hectares of rice during a drought year and 1,133 less hectares of wheat. This may indicate that farmers are taking on more risk during drought years in the hope that price inflations for rice will be more profitable. Furthermore, this study used data from the Indian Census of 2011 to explore the occurrence of socio-economic and cultural disparities in relation to drought and agricultural production. Statistics on labor, scheduled castes and tribes, and illiteracy were used as proxies to identify districts where impoverished communities reside. Correspondingly, among global change topics, there is growing literature around the concept of “double exposure”, which suggests that certain communities are vulnerable to a multiplicity of social and environmental factors. Several steps were taken to identify and map the districts in India that could be doubly exposed to both droughts and socio-economic or cultural status in agrarian areas. Overall, this study found changes in drought patterns, their relationship to rice and wheat production, and provided a platform for future data collection in the context of regional climate change and agrarian vulnerability. Key Words: drought, sc-PDSI, India, agriculture, double exposure, climate change ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My utmost gratitude is due to my thesis committee. Special thanks to—Dr. Kvamme for providing statistical and geoprocessing guidance; Dr. Boss for constant encouragement and conversations about sustainable development; Dr. Davidson for data advice; Dr. Nalley for input on agricultural economics; and Dr. Paradise for our many discussions about this thesis, potential outcomes and implications. A number of fellow graduate students deserve my thanks: Chris Angel, Mark Agana, Grant West, Evan Thaler, Michael Eastham, Daniel Gadeke, Chris Pryor, and all others who have contributed to the numerous and evolving conversations on this topic. Furthermore, I would not have come this far without my wife Natalie B. Shew. I could not have done this without her enduring support and encouragement, not to mention a year delay in her career to join me in India. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program under Grant No. (DGE-1450079). DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to the farmers of South Asia—in the hope that we can better understand and find solutions to the vast problems latent in drought conditions and environmental change throughout the sub-continent. TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER 1: Introduction ……………………………………………………………………...1 CHAPTER 2: Study Site & Geographic Context ……………………………………………...7 2.1 Administrative Boundaries …………………………………………………………………8 2.2 Human Geography ………………………………………………………………………...11 2.3 Agricultural Geography: Physical Geography and Agro-Climatic Zones ………………...20 CHAPTER 3: Literature Review ……………………………………………………………...37 3.1 Global Environmental Change …………………………………………………………….38 3.2 Framework for Drought Policy Development and Assessment …………………………...42 3.3 A Brief History of Drought and Famine in India ………………………………………….50 3.4 Defining and Measuring Drought …………………………………………………………53 3.5 Characteristics of Major Food-Grain Production …………………………………………58 CHAPTER 4: Methodology ……………………………………………………………………61 4.1 Data and Software …………………………………………………………………………61 4.2 Geospatial Methods: the self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index ………………...62 4.3 Analysis of Rice and Wheat Production …………………………………………………..66 4.4 Identifying Vulnerable Districts …………………………………………………………..69 4.5 Assumptions and Limitations ……………………………………………………………..71 CHAPTER 5: Results and Analysis …………………………………………………………...73 5.1 Droughts: Spatial Patterns in Frequency and Severity ……………………………………73 5.2 Droughts and Agricultural Impacts ………………………………………………………..86 5.3 Identifying Vulnerable Districts …………………………………………………………..91 CHAPTER 6: Discussion ……………………………………………………………………….94 6.1 Agricultural Impacts: What we don’t know……………………………………….............94 6.2 The Future of Agrarian Life in India ……………………………………………………...96 6.3 Drought Policy Recommendations ………………………………………………………..98 CHAPTER 7: Conclusion and Implications …………………………………………………100 CHAPTER 8: Works Referenced ……………………………………………………….........103 APPENDICES …………………………………………………………………………………114 A. Photographs ……………………………………………………………………………….115 B. Python and R Scripts ……………………………………………………………………...129 C. State-level sc-PDSI Bar Plots ……………………………………………………………..134 D. Global Moran’s I Statistic for Spatial Auto-Correlation by Decade ……………………...147 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1 India’s States …………………………………………………………………………..9 Figure 2.2 India’s Districts within States ………………………………………………………...10 Figure 2.3 District: Total Population …………………………………………………………….12 Figure 2.4 Illiteracy by District …………………………………………………………………..14 Figure 2.5 Scheduled Caste by District…………………………………………………………..15 Figure 2.6 Scheduled Tribes by District …………………………………………………………16 Figure 2.7 Main Cultivators by District ………………………………………………………….18 Figure 2.8 Main Agricultural Labor by District ………………………………………………….19 Figure 2.9 Distribution of Indian Soils …………………………………………………………..22 Figure 2.10 Relief and River Map of South Asia ………………………………………………..24 Figure 2.11 Mt. Kangchenjungua from Darjeeling ………………………………………………26 Figure 2.12 Cultivation of Mountain Rice near Darjeeling ……………………………………...26 Figure 2.13 Cultivation of Rice Paddy in Kuttanad, India ………………………………………27 Figure 2.14 Köppen-Geiger Climate Classifications in Asia ……………………………………28 Figure 2.15 Advance of 2012 Monsoon vs. Normal Monsoon…………………………………..30 Figure 2.16 Indian Rice Production
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