Sengupta, M. and Dalwani, R. (Editors). 2008 Proceedings of Taal2007: The 12th World Lake Conference: 1158-1163 Strengthening Communities and Institutions for Sustainable Management of Vembanad Backwaters, Kerala Priyadarsanan Dharma Rajan1*, Seema Purushothaman1, Siddhartha Krishnan1, Kiran, M.C. 1, Deepak, D.2 and Jojo. T.D. 2 1Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE) 659, 5th A main, Hebbal, Bangalore - 560 024, India. 2Community Environmental Resource Centre (CERC) Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Ammankovil Street, Mullackal, Alappuzha, Kerala, India. *Corresponding author: Email :
[email protected]. ABSTRACT The Vembanad wetland complex is the largest tropical wetland ecosystem on the southwest coast of India. It is a designated Ramsar site, a wetland of global importance for its biodiversity values. It is also an important resource area for local livelihoods dependent on fishing and allied industries, an important tourist destination and supports a highly productive agricultural system including the ‘rice bowl of Kerala’. All the major livelihood activities of Alappuzha are water-based and depend largely on Vembanad lake. The lake is used for fishing, mining sand and lime shell deposits, harvesting live clams, and tourism related activities. Surrounding land mass is used for rice cultivation, plantation crops, housing, tourist resorts, industries etc. All these ‘water based enterprises’ depend upon environmental integrity of the Vembanad Lake and the surroundings. The environmental conditions of the lake is in a steady decline due to severe anthropogenic pressures and all these activities are to various degrees in decline because of socio-economic and ecological changes happening in the region.