Climate change trends in some of the rubber growing regions of North-East India
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.19071/jpc.2015.v43.i3.2852Abstract
Climate change  analysis has been conducted using daily surface meteorological datasets in  respect of nine parameters from five rubber growing locations in the East and  North-East India. Monthly, seasonal and annual variability in meteorological  parameters showed decreasing trends in relative humidity, sunshine hours and  pan evaporation rates coupled with increasing temperature extremes. Rise in  mean temperature was seen to be highest (0.34 0C per decade) for Dhenkanal  which experiences dry sub-humid type of climate. The data on relative humidity  and temperature also revealed the fact that warm surface temperatures, along  with limited moisture availability, may lead to lower relative humidity in  the future, since all the stations are away from the moist coastal belts.  Decreasing trends in sunshine hours were mainly observed during winter and  post monsoon seasons with decreasing number of days even with the optimum  required daily sunshine hours. The fact that there were no significant  changes in the amount of rainfall or the number of rainy days was in  conformity with several earlier reports in the northeast. Mean monthly  decadal variations have also been tested with earlier and recent sets. With  long term trends in most of the weather parameters, being lesser when  compared to that of the traditional rubber growing regions in India, it is  imperative that for rubber cultivation to thrive in this non-traditional  belt, future policy inputs will have to be based depending on the magnitude  of climate change effects.