Hydrologic and carbon services in the Western Ghats: Response of forests and agro- ecosystems to extreme rainfall events.

Despite decades of research, a comprehensive understanding of the linkages between carbon and water relationships in forested ecosystems has remained elusive. Most of the available data come from small experimental catchments in the temperate zone, and are as such not representative of the diversity of soil, vegetation and historical conditions in tropical landscapes, such as the Western Ghats in India (Malmer et al. 2010). Given that these tropical regions support a large fraction of the human population and are subject to intense anthropogenic pressures, there is an urgent need to understand and predict the hydrological and carbon consequences of land-use and climate change in these dynamic landscapes.

The main objectives of the project are:

1. Understand the spatial and temporal dimensions of extreme rainfall events (ERE) in the Western Ghats.
2. Determine the hydrologic and carbon dynamics consequences of large scale forestation in the Western Ghats and adjacent Deccan plateau.
3. Assess the vulnerability ecosystems, natural, semi-natural and agro-ecosystems, to ERE.