Perceptible changes on a global and regional scale are evident in earth's climate. In India, observed changes include an increase of air temperature, regional monsoon variation, frequent droughts and a regional increase in severe storm incidence in coastal states of India, along with indication of Himalayan glacier recession. The impact is being felt in the inland aquatic resources and their fisheries. Analysis of time series data of 30 years from published literature and from current investigations on the River Ganga and water bodies in its plains, indicate increased minimum water temperatures; 1.5°C in colder stretches of the Ganga and 0.2 to 1.6°C in the aquaculture farms of the State of West Bengal in the Gangetic plains. Rainfall has also increased in the post monsoon months of September–December. The impact is manifested in the breeding failure of the Indian Major Carps (IMC) and a consequent decline in fish spawn availability in river Ganga. Whereas, in fish farm hatcheries on the plains, a positive impact on breeding was observed in the advancement and extension of the breeding period of IMC by 45–60 days. A geographic shift of warm water fish species Glossogobius gurius and Xenentodon cancila to the colder stretch of the river Ganga was recorded. The predator prey ratio in the middle stretch in the river Ganga has also declined from 1:4.2 to 1:1.4 in the last three decades. Fish production has shown a distinct change in the last two decades in the middle stretch of river Ganga where the contribution of IMC has decreased from 41.4% to 8.3% and that of miscellaneous and catfish species increased. Climate change in India will put an additional stress on ecological and socio-economic systems that are already facing pressure. Thus the specific climate variables of importance to inland fisheries viz. enhanced water temperature, extreme events like flood and drought, storms and water stress require specific adaptation actions. An integrated water shed management strategy is essential going from the village level to the river basin level in a unified manner. Finally, it is suggested that assessments of inland fisheries vulnerability to climate change should also assess economic scenarios since adaptive capacity is closely linked to the financial capabilities.
To elucidate the deleterious effects of excessive lead (Pb) on rice (Oryza sativa) cv. Swarn Mansoori, plants were grown in refined sand in complete nutrient solution for 42 days. On the 43rd day, Pb nitrate was superimposed at 1 mM (to rice) for 104 days (till harvest). A set of plants in complete nutrient solution was maintained as control for the same period. Excess Pb reduced the dry weight pronouncedly at harvest (after 104 days of metal supply) when the grain yield also decreased. Lead accumulation reduced the concentrations of chlorophyll in leaves, carotene, sugars, phenols, nonprotein nitrogen, protein, iron, manganese, copper, zinc, Hill reaction activity, and peroxidase activity (one of the anti-oxidative enzymes), but increased the concentrations of sulphur, phosphorus, magnesium (early stage) protein nitrogen, and activity of catalase, ORDER REPRINTS acid phosphatase, and ribonuclease in leaves of rice. Except for slight growth depression and reduction in number and size of leaves, tillers and inflorescence, no other visible symptoms of excessive Pb could be seen before harvesting.
In recent years climate variability has threatened the sustainability of inland fisheries and dependent fishers in India. Systematic methodology to assess the vulnerability of the fisheries sector to climate variability is currently not available. Towards this end, the present work deals with the assessment of inland fisheries vulnerability to climate variations in 13 districts of West Bengal state in India. For this purpose, a composite vulnerability index (0.0-1.0) has been developed on the basis of functional relationships amongst sensitivity, exposure and adaptive capacity using 19 indicators related to inland fisheries. The data obtained reflected different spatial combinations of climate exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity among the districts. Five districts were highly vulnerable which was attributable to low adaptive capacity of the fishers which played an important role in altering the spatial pattern of vulnerability among the districts. Thus our research will provided an important basis for policy makers to develop appropriate adaptation strategies to minimize the risk of fisheries sector to climate variability.
The main aim of this paper is to develop an approach based on trapezoidal fuzzy numbers to optimize transportation problem in fuzzy environment. The present algorithm has representation of availability, demand and transportation cost as trapezoidal fuzzy numbers. This algorithm is found quicker in terms of runtime as comparison to fuzzy VAM discussed in [Kaur A., Kumar A., A new method for solving fuzzy transportation problem using ranking function, Appl. Math. Model. 35:5652–5661, 2011; Ismail Mohideen S., Senthil Kumar P., A comparative study on transportation problem in fuzzy environment, Int. J. Math. Res. 2:151–158, 2010]. On the other hand this technique gives much better results than some classical methods like north-west corner and least cost method. Another benefit of this algorithm is that for certain transportation problems it directly gives optimal solution. It is one of the simplest methods to apply and perceive. Practical usefulness of the new method over other existing methods is demonstrated with two numerical examples.
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