HSOA Journal of Environmental Science: Current Research Socio Economic Impact Due to Climate Variability on Selected Villages of Ukhrul and Thoubal Districts, Manipur

As global climate change continues, many of the villages are likely to become vulnerable at present. The altering of spring shed cycles, rainfall pattern, evaporation, precipitation and temperature are all subjected to climate variability and change. The present paper defined to study the socio-economic impacts due to climate variability on certain villages of Ukhrul and Thoubal districts, Manipur. Tentha and Khekman village are selected from Thoubal district where as Shirui and Hungpung village are selected from the Ukhrul district based on their vulnerable status. Socio economic and livelihoods status were conducted with the structured questionnaire interview and informal discussions. Questionnaire system was used to get responses in a standardized and cost-effective way. The one-way forward option is to reduce the socio-economic vulnerability and improve the ecological systems and services.

incidence and dependency on government funds. In such cases, rural communities tend to be more vulnerable in comparison to urban counterparts. Therefore, the need of time is to delineate climate change impacts across rural and urban communities, and to develop appropriate policies to mitigate or adapt the impacts. Public awareness and capacity building will enhance more on understanding the present scenario of climate change. Moreover, facilitate assessment of climate change vulnerabilities and risk on bio-physical and socio-economy in terms of water, agriculture, forest and health sectors geared towards reducing climatic vulnerability is warranted. According to Hewitt [2], social vulnerability is the susceptibility of a given population to be harmed from exposure to a hazard, directly affecting its ability to prepare for, respond to, and recover. Furthermore, Houghton [1], calculated the temperature increase in the last hundred years and the last three decades have been successively warmer at the Earth's surface than any preceding decade since 1850 IPCC [3], Moreover, climate change impacts on human health could occur through both direct (e.g., thermal stress) and indirect (e.g., disease vectors and infectious agents) pathways. Karl [4], suggested that direct impacts could result from increased exposure to temperature (heat waves, winter cold) and other extreme weather events (floods, cyclones, storm-surges, droughts) and increased production of air pollutants and aeroallergens such as spores and molds.

Materials and Methods
Both valley and hills formed the State, Manipur. According to the Forest Survey of India FSI [5], report, the state lies between Latitude of 23°83'N-25°68'N and a Longitude of 93°03'E -94°78'E. The total area covered by the State is 22,327 sq. kms. Due to its different topographical location, terrain diversity, altitudinal variation and river system, the state experiences diverse climate variability especially in terms of ecosystem, biodiversity and livelihood, agriculture & its allied, water resources, forest, health, etc. It is therefore necessary to pay attention to climate disaster and other geo physical parameters in order to secure the future environment and also to help state build resilience for these dramatic climate and weather extremes.
Authors prepared structured type questionnaire for defining the village socio economic profile. Interview and informal discussions were conducted to overcome the poor response rates of a normal questionnaire survey. Moreover, personal interview of local youth, women's and leaders of the village community of varying ages, sexes and economic background to ensure clarity and effectiveness of the questions before use. Respondents were selected from different sex, age group, educational, social and economic classes. Secondary data were obtained from the office file, research works and published article etc ( inundating many of the agricultural fields losing different varieties of crop species. The local describe drought like situation after the floods. The worse condition is the reduction of rice production in the defined villages after post floods ( Table 2).

Ukhrul district (Hungpung and Shirui):
The villages (Shirui and Hungpung) reflect floods and landslides on regular interval of time. At recent times, the villages receive heavy rainfall during the pre-monsoon season causing landslides. Moreover, the destruction and degradation of surrounding forests led to the problem of water scarcity during lean season of the year. In most cases, spring is near to threatened due to the felling of trees for Livelihood purposes. Moreover, erratic rainfall, no rainfall and even heavy rainfall disturbs the agriculture and agricultural practices. The introduction of new insect species is another notable achievement in the selected villages. (Table 3)

Results and Discussion
During the study period from January 2020 to December, 2020, it was difficult time for the authors as the pandemic covid-19 disturbs the whole state of Manipur. It was observed that the authors found that most people in the selected villages (Tentha and Khekman While in Ukhrul (Hundung and Shirui), shifting cultivation is practicing in the villages for their livelihood. In addition, the villages rear livestock for supplement of household economy. Some of the important livestock are cow, chicken, boar, buffalo etc. Out of the 1265 population in Shirui village, 51 people are engaged in government department, 128 people on agriculture and 13 on agricultural activities, 32 as self-employed and number of students stand at 363. Whereas, out of the 10785 population in Hundung village, 80% have their own family agricultural land as many of the villagers depend on agriculture for their socio-economic livelihoods. Moreover, women play a vital role in income generating activities. They sell vegetables, fruits, firewood and other products Non Wood Forest Products (NWFP) found in the forest. At present, all come to a halt to the changing scenario of rainfall patterns, as little rainfall, no rainfall and heavy rainfall etc in the hills. More often, people spend little time in agricultural activities than the earlier. The reason is identified as low productivity of paddy cultivation. Many of the springs are dried up during the summer and winter months of the year leading to water scarcity in both the hill villages. According to Pimentel [8], maintaining biological diversity is essential for productive agriculture, and ecologically sustainable agriculture. Butt [9], suggests that it will be good to change to other crops that maintain forest cover and diversity, diversify the agricultural areas implementing more crops, or change the cropping pattern in warm regions shifting toward patterns used in hotter regions. Therefore, Reilly and Schimmelpfennig [10], recommend adaptation as an important component in any policy response to climate change. Furthermore Challinor [11], mentioned that farmers and producers need to have physical, agricultural, economic, and social resources to moderate, or adapt to, the impacts of climate variability. Parry and Carter and Met Office [12,13] defined, for those people depends on agriculture and cultural practices, food security is an issue of major concern, because climate change will affect crop yields and agriculture. On the other, farmers and producers need to identify the way of crop infection and the way forward option to reduce the way of infection (Table 4).

Conclusion
The study brings out suggestion in order to understand the scenario of climate variability and change in the selected villages. Firstly, the selected villages need to connect with various stakeholders such as farmers, line department officials, scientists, policy makers etc. to understand the present situation in terms of temperature rise, erratic rainfall, etc. Secondly, people depend on agriculture and agricultural practices needs to be trained with the help of the concerned department. Thirdly, awareness, workshop and capacity building to understand the various aspects of coping with climate variability. Fourthly, modern application and communication tools related to climate variability and change must utilized appropriately, for timely and proper dissemination of climate related information.