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Climate variability, disasters and their impacts assessment in Manahari, rural municipality of Makwanpur, Nepal


Journal of Historical Archaeology & Anthropological Sciences
Bindu Subedi, Ram Asheshwar Mandal, Dhruba Lochan Adhikari, Ajay Bhakta Mathema

Abstract

Nepal is climatically very sensitive country because of long drought, heavy floods, landslides and soil erosion caused by changing pattern of rainfall and temperature. However, there are very limited studies related to these issues, thus this research was objectively carried out to analyze temperature and precipitation trend of study area, examine the climate pattern and assess the impacts of climate change hazards on different sectors. Ward number 7 and 8 Manahari Rural Municipality of Makwanpur district was selected as the study site. Total 40 households survey, 15 Key informants interview and two focus group discussions were conducted involving the affected local to collect the primary data. Moreover, secondary data specifically monthly maximum and minimum temperature and rainfall for thirty one years between 1985–2015 were gathered from nearest meteorological station i.e. NFI Hetauda Station (Station No. 906) and Manahari Station (Station No. 920). The drought trend was calculated using the ratio of Precipitation<2Temperatures. The theoretical distribution i.e. Gumbel, Log-Pearson and Log Normal models were applied to predict the flood peaks and maximum rainfalls. The mean annual temperature was increasing at the rate of 0.0226°C per year. The highest mean annual temperature was 24.1°C in 2015. It was found that, the number of days exceeding the maximum average temperature in the period of 31 years. However, the trend of total annual precipitation in Hetauda was decreasing at the rate of 5.6607 mm per year. The highest rainfall was recorded about 3323.1 mm in year 2002 and it was the least only 1626.2 mm in 2012. The January, February, March, November and December were the driest months. Flood frequency using Log Pearson showed the highest flood in 1000 years return period. The mean rank was the highest of drought having value 5 while it was the lowest only 1.4 of flood. The slope failure at the edges of the rural roads also causes landslides which also fills the agriculture land. The locals responded that the drainage systems were poor and there were no protection structure and/or biological component to reduce landslide risk during construction periods. Major five disasters were recorded in Manahari during from March to June whereas, wildlife attack throughout the year and so on.

Keywords

climatic variability, impact, disaster, temperature, precipitation, Manahari, Makwanpur

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