Agro-Biodiversity of Kumaun Himalaya , India : A Review

Kumaun Himalaya is one of the unique systems, rich in indigenous traditional knowledge and culturally strong. In the present study, qualitative and quantitative data were collected on agrobiodiversity through field and literature survey. Altogether, 161 plant species belonging to 117 genera and 57 families were recorded. In addition, a large number of land races, varieties and wild relatives are also being used. Cultivation of these crops is mainly of subsistence in nature rather than for commercial purposes. Due to a number of reasons, the area under traditional crops is declining in Kumaun Himalayan region but many of the crop varieties are still conserved because of their socio-cultural and religious values. The human population has increased over time forcing farmers to change their cropping patterns, for example, replacement of mixed cropping to mono-cropping and switching over to cash crops. This has adverse implications on traditional agro-biodiversity of the region. There are both local and global advantages in supporting a dynamic traditional system of agro-biodiversity management. Therefore, promotion and conservation of agro-biodiversity should be done through sustainable use and onfarm and offfarm management.


INTRODUCTION
Agro-biodiversity refers to the humanmanaged or modified biological diversity for general agricultural purposes.It is the synergy and interaction between living things, land, technology and social systems.Agro-biodiversity is regarded as the sub-set of biodiversity that includes the diversity and variability of plants, animals, micro-organisms and in situ and ex situ conservation of genetic resources linked with agriculture 1 .In sustaining and strengthening food, nutrition, health and livelihood security all over the world, agriculture biodiversity play a pivotal role.Besides growing a few crops, people frequently collect wild edible and other plants from natural habitats to meet their subsistence needs 2 .It has been proven that agro-biodiversity can help to increase crop productivity while diseases can be controlled in the agroecosystems [3][4][5][6][7] .
There are at least 3000 edible plant species known to man, with merely 30 crops contributing to nearly 95% of the world's calories intake and only 103 crops are economically important at national level 8 .There are many socioeconomic benefits of crop-diversity and their wild relatives such as "Genes from wild wheat in Turkey saved an epidemic of the wheat disease in USA in the 1960's 9 .There are several other instances where the wild relatives have contributed in the improvement of their cultivated varieties of rice, maize, potato, sugarcane, wheat, tomato etc 9 .Thus, the wild relatives provide the necessary "genetic materials" to boost productivity and biological resistance to counter pests and disease.
With varied types of climate (subtropical to alpine), altitude, topography, soil types, valleys, rivers, watersheds and forest resources, Kumaun Himalayan region of Uttarakhand state is suitable for the growth of all kinds of plants.Floristically and ethno-botanically this area has been studied by number of workers [10][11][12][13][14] .However, the agriculture diversity including land races and its wild relatives are not properly documented.In recent years, documentation of traditional knowledge on cultivated crops, landraces and wild relative plants become a prerequisite to preserve traditional knowledge of a region.Therefore, the present study was carried out to collect valuable information on agro-diversity, traditional land races and its related indigenous knowledge of Kumaun Himalayan region.Further this study will also be helpful in: i. Taking appropriate steps for documenting the indigenous knowledge related to genetic resources; ii.Conservation and sustainable utilization of genetics resources; iii.Providing resources to the needy person or technologists; iv.Including them under IPRs; v. Promoting sustainable utilization of resources with fair and equitable sharing of the benefits accruing by their use and vi.establishing farmer's rights over their collective knowledge and resources base.

Agricultural practices in Kumaun
Agriculture is one of the major occupation of the hill people because of the various agro-climate zone along the altitudinal gradient viz., (i) lower altitude (up to 1200m) (ii) middle altitude (between 1200-2300 m) and (iii) higher altitudes (above 2300 m).The cultivated land of this region is mainly divided into three categories 15 .a.
Land of forest edges (waste land near crop fields dominated with scrub vegetation) b.
Upraon-land of hill sites (having no irrigation facilities) c.
Talaon-land of valley bottom (having irrigation facilities) Upraon and Talaon are the traditionally accepted categories of this region.Usually three or four crops are taken within twelve months (from November to October).These crops are: a.
Kharif crop (April to October) b.
Ravi crop (November to April) c.
Jayad crop (April to October)Kitchen garden, waste places, side of cultivated lands fields near houses are used for this purpose.

Shifting cultivation
There are many evidence of shifting cultivation in Kumaun felling of trees and clearing of forests was usually practicised by Kumaunies to increase the crop farming.Crops like Potato, Kuuni, Chaulai, Muli, Gahat, Maduwa etc were cultivated by our ancestors during shifting cultivation.In recent year shifting cultivation is not seen anywhere in Kumaun Himalaya.

Crop Rotations
The traditional method of rotation of Kumaun Himalaya are as follows (Table 1a):

Mixed cropping
The farmers of Kumaun Himalaya still practicing of sowing a mixture of many traditional crops into a single plot of land.The following mixtures of seeds are commonly used by farmers into a single plot of land in Kumaun Himalaya (Table 1b).
Ugal-Cultivated extensively in Darma and Vyans valleys of Kumaun Himalaya and is widely cultivated in kitchen garden in low altitude in the study area.
transplanted in these fields.Demographic records show that majority of the population in Kumaun hills dwell in villages scattered over valleys and slopes.Valleys are surrounded by characteristic vegetational composition.The agricultural lands are often terraced on various degrees of slopes.
There is a striking difference between traditional and modern agriculture (Table 1).It is evident from the comparison that the traditional land races are well adapted to local conditions of moisture stress, disease/pests risk, etc., while the modern crops/cultivars have a narrow genetic base suited specialized conditions of high inputs and high environment risk 16 Indigenous farming system of this region is quite scientific.Traditional practice involves the sowing of mixture of multiple crop seeds into a single terraced field which helps the farmers to supply different kinds of foods, maintaining crop biodiversity, restore soil fertility (by the use of leguminous plants), reduces the infection of pests and pathogen (traditional crop posses the inherent qualities to withstand the sudden outbreak of disease, pests and natural hazards, which protects the traditional farmers from absolute crop failure since millennial), locally well adopted, sometimes it is predicted that

Cultivated crops
The crop diversity in Kumaun Himalaya is very high, which is maintained through mixed cropping or crop rotations and planting multipurpose trees or traditional agroforestry species along the border and waste lands of cultivated fields.Horticultural crops are also cultivated by farmers, which further enhance the biodiversity.The following inventory of the different cultivars, their characteristics wild relatives, diversity, cultural practices, uses pattern was collected from the farmers, through direct interventions as well as the work of Atkinson 23 , Duthie 10 , Negi and Pant 15 , etc.Recently introduced species/germ plasms of crop plants are also recorded.World community depends on 600 species cf.Harlen 34 Out of 2400 species, 160 species belongs to Indian gene centre cf.
Zeven and Zhukovskey 32 and Zeven and de Wet 33 20 Species are of prime important in which the whole of the world is dependent cf.
Harlen 34 environment and are more sustainable than modern farming system 36,37 .These systems are gradually abandoned to meet the demand for agricultural products with the population growth 38,39,40 .Because of changes in landuse systems, deforestation, population pressure, urbanization, degradation of land races, and over-harvesting of non-timber forest products, agrobiodiversity is now declining very quickly from the ecosystems at species, variety and management system levels.So instead of diversified crop fields, farmers are now concentrated on few commercially demanded crops.If serious view of existing situation is not taken into account, the region will lose traditional knowledge of cultivation and uses of these crops forever and would also lose the possibility of being a diverse and nutritive food producing region.
In recent past, the crop diversity has declined to an alarming rate except few isolated pockets of remote areas.Some of the important reasons are:(a) Monoculture cropping system (b) Unplanned change in cropping systems (c) Change in food habits of local people (d) Accidental or deliberate introduction of exotic species (e) Construction of multipurpose dams and road (f) Replacement of traditional crops by high yielding varieties or cultivation of cash crops.

Suggested strategies for agrodiversity conservation in Kumaun Himalaya
Traditional crops and land races should be conserved in the research centers and gene banks.Farmers should be motivated for in-situ conservation of their traditional crops and land races.In-situ conservation of traditional crops and land races could succeed when these crops are strongly linked with the economic development of farmers.
Awa r e n e s s a n d c a p a c i t y bu i l d i n g programmes should be conducted to enable the local people to use highly diversified crop plants, to increase agricultural productivity, to conserve the diversified crops as in-situ germplasm for future use and to understand their services to mankind not only as a source of food, fuel, fodder, fibre etc. but also for ecological services.

Fig. 1 :
Fig. 1: Number of plant species belonging to different families

Fig. 4 :
Fig. 4: Mega Gene Centre of Cultivated plants and some other related details. (Box No. 1 and 2 and 3 based on Zeaven and Zhukovskey32 and Zevaen and de Wet33.Box.No. 4 and 5 based on Harlen34.Vide35).

Table 1 : Differences between Traditional and Modern Agriculture 17,16
The mixed crops are mainly vegetables.d.Intermediate crop (May to August) -Irrigated fields are practiced for this purpose.The main crops are Ganiyar or Cheena (Panicum miliaceum), and Makka (Zea mays).After harvesting the crops, paddy plants are

Table 2 : Agro-diversity* of the Kamaun Himalaya Latin name of plant Common/ vernacular Altitude ranges
*The above list of agro-diversity is based on personal observation coupled with 15,18-22 ** These crops are grouped into different categories such cereals, pseudo cereals, major millets, minor millets, oil seeds, vegetables, spices and condiments, pulses, aromatic and medicinal plants, economic and useful plants, cash crops, horticultural crops, miscellaneous uses etc. *** Phapar extensively in Munsyari and Johar valley of Kumaun Himalaya ****Seb It is said that the Bauna seb of Munsyari are highly delicious *****Rajma extensively cultivar at interior area of Munsyari