Mohammad Shafi Bhat

• Ph.D
• Associate Professor at University of Kashmir Srinagar-J&K

The North-Western Himalayas are becoming the hotspots for hydro-meteorological catastrophes due to climate change implications. Present study aims to analyse spatio-temporal dynamics of hailstorms, posing a threat to livelihood security in the Valley of Kashmir on account of significant land use shift from agriculture to horticulture which is highl...

This study delves into the crucial realm of disaster risk assessment pertaining to educational infrastructure in mountain geographies, employing the PROMETHEE-II (Preference Ranking Organization Method for Enrichment Evaluations) technique. The study was carried out in Central Kashmir which is susceptible to various hazards, making the assessment o...

Landslides often result in damage to property and loss of life in the Himalayan Region because of high seismicity and rugged terrain. To address this issue, the current study focused on developing a landslide inventory based susceptibility map for Kargil-Ladakh Region of North-Western Himalaya. The landslide susceptibility map for the region was ge...

People's participation in decision-making processes in the domain of forest management has been acknowledged as an effective mechanism for improving livelihoods and forest conditions. The present study makes an attempt to ascertain the participation levels and identify the factors influencing the people's participation in Joint Forest Management (J...

Environmental knowledge, attitude and sustainable behaviour of the people have become fundamental elements of sustainable forest management. Kashmir Himalayas is an ecologically fragile region, inhabited by various ethnic and tribal communities with low levels of education and heavy dependence on forest resource utilization. The lack of adequate en...

Climate change poses serious threats to agriculture and horticulture, particularly in ecologically fragile and climate-sensitive regions such as the North Western Himalayas of Jammu and Kashmir. This study investigates farmers’ perceptions of climate change and the adaptation strategies they employ in response. The region, marked by limited livelih...

Gender and climate change is emerging as one of most sensitive issues in recent times. Existing studies have demonstrated gender divide in critical dimensions such as climate change perceptions, climate change concern, adaptation and mitigation strategies. This study aims at a more nuanced gender analysis at intra-household level in South Kashmir,...

Traffic congestion is a common problem in developing countries, especially in major cities that cost huge sums of money and labour hours, and all signs point to it worsening in the future, endangering the quality of urban life. Evaluating the economic implications of urban traffic congestion is essential for improving productivity, maximizing infra...

Vegetable enterprise in the valley of Kashmir holds tremendous significance as it ensures the nutritional requirements of the population, enhances the profitability of the farming sector, and has enormous employability potential in this predominantly agrarian economy. The present study explores the logistics of vegetable enterprises, primarily focu...

Vegetable enterprise in the valley of Kashmir holds tremendous significance as it ensures the nutritional requirements of the population, enhances the profitability of the farming sector, and has enormous employability potential in this predominantly agrarian economy. The present study explores the logistics of vegetable enterprises, primarily focu...

The Kashmir Valley, situated in the North-Western Himalayas, is susceptible to multiple hazards, having endured various calamities. This current research aims to conduct a comparative assessment of the risks posed by Health, Safety and Environmental hazards at specific locations within three public universities of the region. The objective was to e...

This research paper assesses the disaster preparedness of educational infrastructure in Central Kashmir, employing the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) methodology. Its primary objective is to gauge the preparedness level of educational institutions and identify crucial factors influencing their capacity to effectively mitigate and respond to disas...

The Kashmir Himalayas, a fragile mountainous, region, are experiencing the adverse effects of climate change, including rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, and extreme weather events. This study, based on primary data from 384 respondents in the Kashmir Valley, assesses people's perceptions of climate change impacts, particularly on temperature,...

The Kashmir Himalayas, a fragile mountainous, region, are experiencing the adverse effects of climate change, including rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, and extreme weather events. This study, based on primary data from 384 respondents in the Kashmir Valley, assesses people's perceptions of climate change impacts, particularly on temperature,...

The Jammu and Kashmir union territory is the largest producer of walnuts in India, and this crop provides an important source of livelihood for many farmers. This study aims to measure the economic efficiency and profitability of walnut orchards and explore constraints in cultivation in the Kashmir Valley. It relies on a crosssectional database col...

In Kashmir, natural catastrophes such as earthquakes, floods, landslides, and droughts have disrupted daily life in a multitude of areas to the point that people are already experiencing the damaging consequences of these disasters in one way or another. To evaluate the effects of incidents on the educational services in Kashmir Valley, an integrat...

The article reviews research into market gardening farming system. It considers, first what the concept of market gardening mean, its existing terminologies across the globe. It discusses concept evolution, subsequent intensification, diversification with main emphasis on commercialized vegetables. Lastly, the paper reflects advantages in the conte...

The study aims to provide viable criteria to assess land suitability for apple growing in Kashmir Valley, India. It used a Delphi survey and the analytical hierarchical process (AHP) approach to determine factors influencing apple production. The evaluation criteria were obtained through multiple rounds of the Delphi survey of stakeholders. The...

Agricultural land use change is a major component of global environmental change that concerns food security and the environment. Identification and remediation of these complex processes need methodological diversity to understand human-environmental interactions. The study area has been a prominent hotspot for farmscape alterations recently, thus...

The study aims to provide viable criteria to assess land suitability for apple growing in Kashmir Valley, India. It used a Delphi survey and the analytical hierarchical process (AHP) approach to determine factors influencing apple production. The evaluation criteria were obtained through multiple rounds of the Delphi survey of stakeholders. The Del...

The study aims to ascertain the levels of environmental knowledge among forest dwellers in the Kashmir Himalayas as it exerts a strong influence on people’s attitude and sustainable behaviour towards sustainable forest resource management. The study is based on primary data, which was analysed with the help of Descriptive Statistics and the Binary...

Environmental knowledge, attitude and sustainable behaviour of the people have become fundamental elements of sustainable forest management. Kashmir Himalayas is an ecologically fragile region, inhabited by various ethnic and tribal communities with low levels of education and heavy dependence on forest resource utilization. The lack of adequate en...

The Union Territory of Ladakh, located in the northwestern Himalayan region, is highly vulnerable to natural and anthro-pogenic hazards like earthquakes, landslides, snow avalanches, flash floods, cloud bursts, and border conflicts. Occurrences of these disasters have significantly influenced the development and vulnerability scenario of Trans-Hima...

Mountainous regions are prone to multiple hazards, which often result in loss of life and damage to property. Despite being prone to multiple hazards, the Himalayan Region has a scarcity of multi-faceted hazard studies. In this backdrop, present study aims to develop a multi-hazard susceptibility map for the Kargil-Ladakh Region of Trans-Himalayas...

Jammu and Kashmir is the largest producer of walnuts in India and it acts as an important source of livelihood for a large section of farmers. The present study aims to measure the profitability and economic efficiency of walnut orchards and subsequently explore constraints hindering walnut cultivation in the Valley of Kashmir, India. It relies on...

Financial investments in apple cultivation in Kashmir valley are increasingly recognized as key drivers of economic growth and employment creation. This paper presents a comprehensive economic analysis across physiographic divisions using precise economic indices that include cost-benefit analysis, project evaluation method and other socio-economic...

Snow-avalanches are responsible for loss of life and damage to infrastructure in mountainous areas across the world. The present study aims to integrate traditional knowledge with Geographic Information System (GIS) for generation of snow-avalanche susceptibility map for Kargil-Ladakh Region of Trans-Himalayas. The avalanche susceptibility map has...

Climate change and variability has far reaching impacts on agriculture particularly in ecologically sensitive areas like the Himalayas. The present study attempts to understand the farmer’s perception and adaptation strategies to changing climate in Lidder watershed of Kashmir Himalayas, India. Based on a cross-sectional database of 266 farm operat...

The importance of localized mechanisms was highly realized during the Covid-19 pandemic, which caused a global emergency. The existing mechanisms available at the international, national and state-level miserably suffered during the pandemic which increased subsequent risks in many sectors like education, health, tourism, economy, trade, supply cha...

The Union Territory of Ladakh located in the North-Western Himalayan Region is a multi-hazard prone region, highly vulnerable to seismic hazards, landslides, snow-avalanches, flash-floods and cloud bursts. Besides, anthropogenic hazards like border conflicts and political turmoil in neighboring region of Kashmir has resulted in huge economic loss t...

Horticulture plays a pivotal role in the economy of Jammu and Kashmir. Owing to favourable agro-climatic conditions, temperate horticulture is fast expanding in the state which is characterised by the increasing dominance of apple cultivation. In the present study, an attempt has been made to evaluate the long term trends in the productivity and ar...

Farming is the most dominant land-use in the Kashmir valley, India. However, the region is characterised by low productivity of agricultural crops that includes rice. To this end, the present study aims to measure economic efficiency of farm land inputs using Cobb-Douglas production model and MVP/MFC ratio. The results reveal that rice production o...

Mountainous regions of the world act as the reservoirs of water due to their enormous snow and glacier resources. Quantification of snow and glacier melt runoff is important for water resource management in the downstream areas. The present study applies Snowmelt Runoff Model (SRM) to estimate the streamflow for Sind catchment in Kashmir Himalayas....

The warming of planet earth is an undeniable fact and is the major challenge confronted by our planet. Mountains ecosystems which are mostly inhabited by economically and scientifically backward communities are considered as early indicators of climate change. Precipitation is one of the most important variables of the climate and is used as an ind...

North Western Himalayan (NWH) Region has witnessed the pronounced impact of climatic variability during the course of 20 th century. In this region and beyond over the past century both mean maximum and mean minimum temperature has considerably increased and precipitation has witnessed a significant decline. Present study reveals that discharge of...

The levels of development of different districts of Jammu and Kashmir has been obtained with the help of composite index based on optimum combination of twenty nine developmental indicators. The district-wise data on these indicators for the year 2011-12 were used for obtaining the level of development of all the twenty two districts of the State....

Ladakh region being a high elevation cold desert of India is marked by extreme aridity with acute moisture deficit throughout the year. Annual precipitation is extremely low due to rain shadow effect caused by Karakoram ranges on one side, mighty Greater Himalayas and Zanskar ranges on the other side. The study of precipitation variability is extre...