Farmers perception on land degradation in tuirini watershed, Mizoram

Local people’s perception particularly, the farmers observation is valid to understand the causes and consequences of land degradation and for successful implementation of appropriate land management procedures to achieve sustainable agricultural development. A wide spatial variability in different forms of land degradation was observed in Tuirini watershed, which occupies about 411.38 km² in Mizoram through local peoples’ perceptions and responses regarding soil degradation, deforestation and water scarcity. The present study is an attempt to analyze the factors responsible for various forms of land degradation along with farmer’s perception in Tuirini watershed. The practices such as shifting cultivation, cutting of forest for fuel wood, lumbering and more interestingly, growing ginger resulted in large scale erosion and deforestation thereby led to massive land degradation. In addition, high pressure of the rapidly increasing population and high degree of land use change resulted in shortening of fallow period thereby induced land degradation. Regarding the water supply, the people in this watershed receiving good amount of rainfall but facing water scarcity due to lack of practicing rainwater harvesting.