Participatory Mapping for Drought Resilience in Jalna District, Maharashtra, India Work in progress Line J. Barkved (NIVA), Armando LaMadrid (CICERO), Ulka Kelkar (TERI), Karianne debruin (CICERO), Guro Aandahl (NIBR), Suruchi Bhadwal (TERI), Trond Vedeld (NIBR) 20 th March 2013 European Climate Change Adaptation Conference (ECCA) Hamburg
EVA project Pilot project: Extreme Risks, Vulnerabilities and Community-Based Adaptation (EVA) in India (2012-14) A need to better understand the perspectives and responses of local communities and policymakers to plan for changes in climatic extremes Interdisciplinary approach using top-down (modeling) & bottom-up participatory approaches 9 rural villages in the drought-prone Jalna district, Maharashtra, India
Focus How can rural communities in Maharashtra adapt to extreme drought? Does participatory mapping serve a useful tool to understand local experiences and perceptions and foster community-based adaptation to extreme drought?
Extreme drought and adaptation Droughts are a natural phenomena Climate change may alter magnitude and frequency of extreme droughts UNISDR (2009) Understanding and managing changing risks Building resilience is essential - the capacity to deal with change SREX (2012)
Drought a multi-dimensional phenomena (Source: National Drought Mitigation Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, U.S.A.)
Participatory mapping A set of approaches and techniques that combines tools of modern cartography with participatory methods to represent the spatial knowledge of local communities 1 Different types from low tech (mapping on the ground) to more high tech (PGIS) Typical applications in literature: resource mapping, natural resource management, forest, floods. less on participatory drought mapping 1: source: http://www.mappingforrights.org/
Level of precision Depends on the objective Who is it important for, and why? (source: McCall 2006)
Jalna district, Maharashtra, India
Jalna district 3 clusters: Bhokardan, Jafrabad, Badnapur. 3 villages in each clusters Dryland, drought prone Semi-arid monsoon climate, erratic rainfall Fall in groundwater level (1998-2007) Source:http://jalna.nic.in/ Agricultural livelihood - Cash crops include in particular cotton
2012-2013: worst drought since 1972
Participatory drought mapping Photo-mapping with satellite imagery printed on A0-sized posters Groups of 8-12 persons with facilitation Sequence of events - Sep 2012: Introduction to the activity in the villages Community resource mapping - Digitizing of first mapping - Feb 2013: Validating of digitization with the community Mapping of drought zones - Digitizing of second mapping - Validating with the community, and evaluation of adaptation options
Sep 2013: Resource mapping Showed interest in the satellite images Mapping the villages boundary was an engaging and tedious task - discussions Different experiences in terms of participation between the villages
Feb 2013: Mapping drought zones Discussing drought and mapping drought zones Drought associated with water availability Spatial variances associated with soil quality In most of the groups, one or two often did most of the drawing
Facilitation How much? Who speaks? Who is holding the pen?
Applied as part of an integrated study with a variety of approaches and tools Participatory mapping Other participatory tools Household survey and interviews GIS Field measurements Secondary data and modeling
Theoretical context From Moser & Ekstrom (2010)
Key points - what have we learned so far? Visualizing community members spatial knowledge provide insight of local variations in perceptions and experienced impacts and vulnerabilities to drought Satellite imagery provided a form of familiarization and intuitiveness Mapping as a process about more than the map itself. A base for dialogue Maps are not neutral objects separate from the social context Ethical concerns the power of maps, role of facilitation Activation of local knowledge
Thank you for your attention Contact: Line Barkved (NIVA) - line.barkved@niva.no EVA Project leader: Trond Vedeld (NIBR) - trond.vedeld@nibr.no EVA website: www.teriin.org/projects/eva