Economic Valuation of Reducing POLICY Land Degradation through Watershed Development in East Madhya Pradesh BRIEF under Risks of Climate Extremes April 2020 Introduction: In India, land under degradation and desertification This study seeks to assess the economic and increased from 81.48 million hectares (mha) in years environmental benefits of reducing land degradation 2003-05 to 82.64 mha in 2011-13 (SAC 2016). Water through sustainable land management practices and wind induced soil erosion, and degradation of the such as watershed development in eastern Madhya vegetative cover are major contributing processes. Pradesh and in the context of climate change. Driven by anthropogenic causes, particularly unsustainable land management practices, land degradation is aggravated by the adverse impacts of Key Findings: climate change. Land degradation affects different • Project villages experience significantly lower sectors - agriculture, forestry, water resources - which soil erosion, higher soil carbon accumulation, hamper livelihoods and threaten the sustainability of greater land and crop productivity, higher biodiversity and ecosystem services. According to an cropping intensity, more available household estimate for the year 2014-15, desertification, land water and reduced migration as local degradation and drought (DLDD) cost India 2.54% employment opportunities increased. of its Gross Domestic Product (TERI in 2016). Hence, timely investment in land restoration is essential; • The NPV of benefits received per household of 3 of the 4 project villages is higher than in the in fact, the investment will be far less than the respective control villages. One control village amount of damage that can happen if we invest in benefitted more from its locational advantage its restoration (IPBES, 2018). As a signatory of the of being a market place and linkages with UNCCD’s Land Degradation Neutrality aim, India government departments. has set an ambitious target of restoring 26 mha of degraded land by 2030 (UNCCD 2019). • Villages which had active community engagement and governance institutions benefitted more than others as they were Madhya Pradesh is one of the hot-spots of land able to enlist cooperation as well as secure degradation that is driven by vegetation degradation additional resources. and water erosion (Le et al., 2014). It is one of the most backward states in terms of human • Maintenance and proper management of development (UNDP 2011). Land productivity is very common assets is often neglected post project low and distress migration is a common problem which results in reduction of environmental and economic benefits. encountered here. Objectives of the Study: i. To assess the land degradation status in some watershed project villages and control villages (without project interventions) based on Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) indicators and to identify the drivers of land degradation. ii. To undertake economic valuation including cost-benefit analysis of the agricultural ecosystem services and Sustainable Land Management (SLM) interventions in project villages iii. To assess the preparedness of study villages to address climate change risks in the selected agro- ecological zones in the light of projected climate changes. 1. The Study area The Kymore Plateau and Satpura hills are a wheat- are: in Mandla district (1) Dungariya and Kui-Ryt; (2) rice zone where the annual rainfall ranges from 1000 Partala and Amdara; (3) Katangi and Paundi-Mal; and mm to 1400 mm; the major soil types are mixed red (4) Kareli and Sihora in Jabalpur district. and black soils (medium). This region faces severe RS-GIS methodology: Continuous seasonal satellite land degradation due loss of vegetation and water imagery related to the years 2008 – 2018 is used to induced erosion. Water scarcity is acute during summer. While agriculture is the main occupation of the inhabitants, a large section of villagers migrate in search of wage work. Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR) has implemented watershed development (WSD) projects in these districts since over a decade. From the many villages where WSD was implemented, four were selected for this study. These are Dungariya, Partala, Katangi in Mandla district, and Kareli in Jabalpur district. The villages implemented WSD from 2008-09 to 2010-11 and in Kareli up to 2011-12. In Dungariya and Partala additionally, the Integrated Watershed Figure 1. Location map of the selected study villages Management Programme (IWMP) was implemented 1 through WOTR and PRADAN respectively from 2014 prepare the land use/ land cover information for the to 2018-19. project and control villages. WSD includes the following SLM interventions: area Pre and post-watershed intervention effects on soil treatment, afforestation including on forest lands and erosion are assessed using the Unit Stream Power- on private lands, drainage line treatment, capacity based Erosion and Deposition (USPED) model for enhancement, institutional building, and promotion modelling soil erosion and deposition in the village. of agriculture and livelihoods. LULC change detection results of 2008 to 2018 are used to identify the potential trend (positive change, 2. Methodology negative change, and no change). Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) of the year 2018 A study was conducted between June 2019 and March combined with LULC change detection is used to 2020. The baseline (pre-project implementation) assess land productivity dynamics (LPD). year was 2008-09 and the year for impact assessment was 2018-2019. The tools of GIS & Remote Sensing, Economic Analysis Methodology: Economic valuation grassroot level stakeholder consultations such as Key of the ecosystem services for three main ecosystem Informant, Household Interviews and Focus Group goods/services i.e. crop, fodder, and water for Discussions were used to assess the impact of SLM household use was done using the TEV framework practices. (ELD, 2015). For crop and fodder, the “market price method” and for household water, “cost avoided For each project village, a control village was selected method” was used. The economic valuation of within the same geographical area having similar reduction in migration was calculated by assessing the features. The 4 sets of project and control villages intrinsic value of work available at the home location using a combination of “market price method” and 2 the “willingness to accept” method 1NGO:Professional Assistance For Development Action (PRADAN) 3. Research Results The impacts of Sustainable Land Management practices implemented in the project villages were assessed using a mix of LDN and economic indicators: land use/ land cover (LULC) data and cropping intensity; land productivity dynamics; soil erosion and soil organic carbon (SOC); crop productivity, household water availability and impact on migration A. Changes in the land use and land cover and cropping intensity Figure 2. LULC change between 2008 and 2018 in project and control villages Land use change from uncultivable land (open scrub crop area has increased by nearly 10 ha (74%); while and barren) to cultivable land (crop and fallows) shows in Amdara (control), a 11% increase is seen in the approximately 50% decrease in both the project and double crop area with reduction in triple crop area control villages of Partala / Amdara; Dungariya / Kui- (-56%). In Paundi Mal, a control village with good Ryt; Katangi / Paundi Mal and in Kareli, indicating an connectivity and having better access to government expansion of areas under agriculture due to growing schemes, the cropping intensity has decreased as dependence of households on agriculture as a means compared to Katangi, its treated village. In Kareli of livelihood. In Sihora the control village of Kareli, (treated) and Sihora (control) villages, only rainfed uncultivable land shows a marked increased (Fig. 2) agriculture is practised; the area under cultivation is indicating a decline in area under cultivation. significantly higher in the project village as compared to its control. In both villages, double and triple However, changes in the multi-seasonal cropping cropping which was minimum earlier, has further (kharif, rabi, and summer) pattern are observed, as reduced. While fallows have increased in Dungariya, also in cropping intensity. In treated villages Partala area brought under agriculture is higher in Kui Ryt and Katangi, this is comparatively higher than their (control) with a marginal increase in double crop area respective control villages of Amdara and Paundi (2.5 ha) and single crop rabi (2.3 ha). Mal. In Partala, the single crop (rabi) area has shifted to double crop area by 22.2 ha (46%), and the triple 3 B. Changes in Soil Erosion and Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) The first set of comparison villages- Dungariya and Kui-Ryt - are in the upper catchment while the second set - Partala and Amdara - are in the lower catchment area of the respective watersheds. Katangi and Paundi Mal are positioned in the middle catchment, while Kareli and Sihora are upper catchment villages. As a natural phenomenon, soil erosion is always higher in the upper catchment area which gets deposited in the lower catchment area. However, with project interventions, soil erosion and thereby loss of soil organic carbon has reduced by 64% in the Dungariya (treated village) as compared with the 23% in control village, Kui Figure 3. Percentage change in Soil Organic Carbon Ryt (Fig. 3). While in Partala which is in the lower between 2008