People and Mountain Environments: Interconnectedness for Sustainable Development in the Himalayas

People living in the mountains maintain a unique relationship with their surrounding environment. Humans have settled in mountainous regions all across the globe for centuries, adapting to the challenging terrains and establishing exceptional cultural practices and lifestyles. Until today, they depend on their immediate ecosystems for their everyday necessities while also conserving those environments through their own traditional practices and belief systems. Understanding and addressing the ease and complexities of the relationship between people and mountains is essential for sustainable development through overall conservation and well-being of both the environment and the communities living in these regions. The mountain communities in the Himalayas and their interconnectedness with their surroundings could provide important insights in this regard. For instance, the interaction between humans and mountains in the Himalayas is diverse, spanning across various cultural, economic, political, environmental and recreational dimensions and parameters. As sustainable development is a core goal of the world today, it is both interesting and pertinent to explore these various aspects and locate possible learnings in the present-day global environmental scenario. Accordingly, this book is an attempt to situate the interconnected between people and the mountains in the Himalayan landscape towards tracing learnings for sustainable development. Our aim is to edit a holistic volume where aspects ranging from ecosystem services to cultural and spiritual significances of the mountains for the local communities and from contributions of the Himalayas in relation to water, agriculture and food practices to the challenges associated with haphazard infrastructural developments and environmental justice implications are adequately addressed. We acknowledge that balancing the human needs of the mountain communities while ensuring environmental conservation is a major challenge. Ecologically fragile and biodiversity rich the Himalayan region is no exception. Further, mountain communities in the Himalayas are facing tremendous challenges in adapting to changing climate conditions, such as altered precipitation patterns and increased frequency of extreme weather events. Unsustainable economic activities in the form of chaotic tourism practices and infrastructural developments among others add to the emerging challenges. Accordingly, it is important to put research efforts towards active sustainable development practices where human needs are met while minimizing undesirable impacts on the Himalayan mountain ecosystems. The Himalayas are critical for global ecological balance. Therefore, this book will not only be helpful for the countries situated in these mountain regions alone, but also will provide useful insights for environmental sustainability at a much larger global scale.

Table of Contents:
Community dependence on the wild habitats: A case study from Manipur, Indo-Burma Hotspot region.- A qualitative study on people's dependence on ecosystem services in Har-ki-Dun Valley, Uttarakhand, Garhwal Himalayas.- Impacts of land use changes in Indian Himalayas: A socio-economic and ecological perspective.- Interconnection between Agriculture and Livelihoods in Har-Ki-Dun Valley, Uttarakhand, Indian Himalaya.- Waste management Challenges and Potential Solutions in the Indian Himalayan Region.- Trade-Offs between Plant Conservation and Ecosystem Services Entail Intricate Socioecological System in Northeast India.-Biodiversity conservation as an optimistic approach to tackle the Climate  Change in the Indian Himalayan Region.- Where the wild things are: Identifying the factors behind and mitigation measures for biodiversity conservation crisis in Himalayas.- Cinchona plantation in the Eastern Himalayas and its potential in prevention and treatment of COVID-19 and other viral diseases.- A Comparative Analysis of Sustainable Development in Bhutan Himalaya & India Himalaya, from a Conservation Perspective.- Rights of Indigenous Peoples vis-a-vis Environmental Justice in the Himalayan Region.- Environmental Justice in the Himalayan Region.- Assessment of Ecosystem Service Reliance: A Case Study of Upper Valley of Kullu district, Himachal Pradesh.

About the Author :
Dr. Anwesha Borthakur is currently a Landhaus Fellow at the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in Germany. She is also affiliated to the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KU Leuven) in Belgium from where she completed her Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2021. Prior to that, she obtained her PhD in science policy from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi, India. She has published over 40 research articles/ book chapters in peer-reviewed, indexed journals and edited volumes on topics associated with environmental sustainability. Her broad areas of research interest include waste governance, electronic and textile waste, traditional ecological knowledge, public engagement for environmental sustainability and scientometric analysis. Dr Pardeep Singh is presently an Assistant professor (Department of Environmental. Science, PGDAV College, University of Delhi New Delhi, India). He obtained his master’s degree. From the Department of Environmental Science Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India. He obtained his doctorate from the Indian Institute of Technology Banaras Hindu University) Varanasi. He has published more than 65 papers in international journals He has also edited more than 45 books with various global publishers.