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Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District Level Mapping of

Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India

Article  in  Ecological Indicators · February 2020

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

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Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District Level Mapping

of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India

G. Balaganesha,*, Ravinder Malhotraa, R. Sendhilb,*, Smita Sirohia, Sanjit Maitic,

K. Ponnusamyc and Adesh Kumar Sharmaa
a
Dairy Economics, Statistics and Management Division, ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute,
Karnal-132 001, Haryana, India.
b
ICAR-Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley Research, Karnal-132 001, Haryana, India.
c
Dairy Extension Division, ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal-132 001, Haryana, India.

*Corresponding authors’ E-mail addresses:

[email protected] (G. Balaganesh); [email protected] (R. Sendhil)

Highlights

 New composite drought vulnerability index was developed comprising crop & dairy
 Categorized districts as high (12), moderate (8) & less (10) drought vulnerable
 Geographically, districts in north eastern and southern zone were highly vulnerable
 Kancheepuram (0.88) registered highest; Erode (0.45) ranked lowest in vulnerability
 No district had higher adaptive capacity than sensitivity & exposure put together

Abstract

In India, Tamil Nadu is one of the states most vulnerable to drought impacting agriculture
and allied activities. This study attempts to develop a new composite drought vulnerability
index (CDVI) comprising both crop and dairy indicators for 30 districts of Tamil Nadu, India.
The computation of index was based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) approach using exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. Initially, indicators were
normalized to make sure that all the indicators are comparable and weights were assigned to
each indicator based on principal component analysis. Then, the districts were classified as
high, moderate and less vulnerable on the basis of magnitude of the index. Coimbatore has
the highest exposure to drought vulnerability (0.58) and the lowest was in Krishnagiri (0.35).
In case of sensitivity, the highest was in Kancheepuram (0.69), while the lowest was in
Tiruppur (0.26). The highest adaptive capacity was observed in Nagapattinam (0.52) and the
lowest was in Tiruppur (0.24). None of the districts had higher adaptive capacity than
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

sensitivity and exposure, combinedly. Overall, CDVI was highest in Kanchipuram (0.88),
lowest in Erode (0.45) and moderate in Thanjavur (0.73). District level vulnerability mapping
showed that twelve districts were categorized as highly vulnerable to drought; eight districts
as moderately vulnerable; and ten districts as less vulnerable. Most of the districts in north
eastern and southern agro-climatic zones; a few districts in Cauvery delta and western zones
of Tamil Nadu had come under high vulnerable category, while a majority of the districts in
north western, western and high rainfall zones were less vulnerable. To mitigate drought
vulnerability, government should focus and aid in developing regional level adaptation
strategies such as water conserving techniques/ farm pond and appropriate policy measures to
safeguard the livelihood from agriculture and dairying. Also, special attention may be given
to local people’s understandings about drought including traditional practices to cope-up
vulnerability.

Keywords: Composite drought vulnerability index (CDVI); Principal component analysis;

Vulnerability mapping.

1. Introduction
Climate change has become a universal problem in the past and present centuries; not only
the problem of a single country/sector. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC, 2007) defined climate change as any change in climate over time, whether because of
natural variability or due to human activity. Climate related risks are formed by a range of
hazards such as changes in temperature and rainfall leading to droughts, or agricultural
losses, which are slow in inception, while tropical storms and floods are rapid in inception as
given by United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which leads to
vulnerability of people especially farm families. According to India Meteorological
Department (IMD), drought is the result of a natural reduction in the amount of rainfall over
an extended period of time, generally a season or more in length, frequently associated with
other climatic factors such as high temperatures, high winds and low relative humidity that
can intensify the severity of the drought event. Drought can also be categorized as
meteorological (due to lack of rainfall), hydrological (because of surface water storage
dryness), agricultural (due to deficiency of root zone soil moisture), and socio-economic
drought (due to water supply deficiency for socio-economic purposes). The first three
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

categories are called as environmental indicators and the last one is known as water resources
indicator (Wilhite, 2000). Globally, combination of land and ocean surface temperature had
shown a warming of 0.85°C (0.65 to 1.06°C) during 1880 to 2012 (IPCC, 2014). Global
temperature increase by the end of this century is expected to be in the range 1.8 to 4.0°C as
per IPCC reports. Global warming consequences may lead to warm and drought years,
declining glaciers and snow cover, heavy rainfall and flash floods, sea level rise. This is more
frequent and posing potential threat to ecosystems including agriculture and livestock sector.
About 10 per cent of projections for the period 2030–2049 indicate crop yield losses of above
25 per cent due to climate change, compared to the late 20th century (IPCC, 2014).

India, one of the developing countries, contains more than 60 per cent of the population
reliant on agriculture. Crop and dairy are the most vital farm enterprises in India. Share of
crop and livestock in Gross Value Added (GVA) was 9.2 per cent and 4 per cent,
respectively, during 2016-17 (National Accounts Statistics, 2018). Production and
productivity of crop and dairy are influenced by a number of socio-economic, environmental
and policy factors. Of late, climate change is also perceived to be an important limiting factor
in crop and dairy production. Temperature, rainfall and humidity are the important climatic
variables, which affect the crop and dairy enterprises significantly. About 68 per cent of the
cultivable area is affected by drought (NIDM, 2012). In India, the incidence of drought
occurs once in every three years as reported in Mishra et al. (2009) and Carrao et al. (2016).
The monetary loss due to drought has been estimated at US$149 billion and around 350
million people were reported to be affected by the drought over a decade (Gupta et al., 2011;
Carrao et al., 2016).

India is heavily reliant on the monsoon to meet its agriculture and water needs. There is a
chance of 10-40 per cent loss in crop production due to climate change during 2080–2100
(Aggarwal, 2008). Nearly 2 per cent annual milk production loss (1.8 million tonnes), i.e., ₹
26.61 billion monetary loss is likely, due to heat stress suffered by cattle and buffaloes on
account of global warming (PTI, 2010). There is a prediction of over 3 million tonnes annual
loss of milk production by the year 2020 due to climate change, which may lead to reduction
in per capita milk consumption (PTI, 2017).
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

In India, Tamil Nadu is a victim state of frequent and recurrent hydro-meteorological events
such as droughts impacting agriculture and allied activities. The agriculture sector in the state
is facing major challenges such as high proportion of dryland agriculture (57%) and more
reliant on rainfall for irrigation. The frequency of drought occurrence in Tamil Nadu is once
in every 2.5 years, which is severe than other states except West Rajasthan (NRAA, 2013).
Agricultural drought vulnerable regions in Tamil Nadu have been identified by GIS-based
Multi Criteria Analysis (MCA), which is more or less similar to blocks recognized by
Drought Prone Area Programme (DPAP) of Government of India (Chandrasekar et al.,
2009). The degree of drought and its severity in the state are because of scarcity in rainfall,
ground water accessibility and reservoir levels. During severe drought years, about 1.5
million hectares of cultivable land is left uncultivated. The years having normal rainfall also
consists of 0.5 per cent of the land, which is left fallow due to huge spatial variability
observed in the rainfall pattern. Severe drought experienced in the state during 2012-13
resulted in a steep fall in agricultural Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) to the tune of
13.04 per cent as compared to 2011-12 (GoI, 2015). A considerable reduction in both area
and yield of some major crops such as paddy, groundnut and sugarcane by about 5.2 to 9.5
per cent has been noticed in the state because of impact of climate change. It is expected that
overall production for these crops would decline between 9 to 22 per cent by 2020
(Palanisami et al., 2009). The high temperature in drought period raises respiration rate in
cattle impacting its production, and in severe cases, immediate loss of cattle has happened
(GoI, 2015). Heat stress in cattle and buffaloes due to high Temperature Humidity Index
(THI) on account of global warming led to the loss of annual milk production in Indian states
such as Uttar Pradesh (25.4 million tonnes), Tamil Nadu (23.8 million tonnes), Rajasthan,
Bihar, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Haryana (PTI, 2010). In the milieu, this study has been
undertaken to assess the district level composite vulnerability to climate change induced
drought in Tamil Nadu for guiding the researchers and policy makers to devise region-
specific adaptation strategies.

2. Vulnerability assessment: An overview

A galore of literature on vulnerability assessment suggests different approaches. An eight-
step approach suggested by Schroter et al. (2005) is one of them; and it has been made for
assessing vulnerabilities to the effects of global change. The eight steps include to: define the
study area, identify the place over time, hypothesize who is vulnerable to what, develop a
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

casual model of vulnerability, find the indicators for vulnerability, operationalize models,
project future vulnerability, and communicate the vulnerability creatively. A majority of the
studies have used IPCC method to assess the climate change vulnerability (Ravindranath et
al., 2011; Gizachew and Shimelis, 2014; Feroze et al., 2014; Maiti et al., 2015; Varadan and
Kumar, 2015; Rao et al., 2016; Sendhil et al., 2018). The socio-economic and bio-physical
indicators were considered under exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity; and mapping
was done for the study areas based on the vulnerability index. Sridevi et al. (2014) used
indicators from five sources such as socio-demographic, climatic, agricultural, occupational
and common property resources to calculate the composite vulnerability index. Chandrasekar
et al. (2009) have used GIS-based MCA comprising various factors under climatic, edaphic,
biotic and social criteria to assess agricultural drought vulnerability in Tamil Nadu. The
identified drought vulnerable regions are almost similar to the blocks identified by DPAP. In
other studies, Thomas et al. (2016) and Kar et al. (2018) have used integrated approach to
assess drought vulnerability by incorporating spatially and temporally varying drought
vulnerability factors. The studies suggested that integrated approach provided better results
than individual factors approach for drought vulnerability assessment. Despite several
researchers’ assessment on vulnerability pertaining to regions or sectors or ecologies, little is
known on the composite index on vulnerability to drought comprising both crop and dairy
indicators. This study is an attempt to fulfill the aforementioned research gap.

3. Materials and Methods

3.1. Study area
Tamil Nadu state has been purposively selected for this study as the state is affected by
frequent and recurrent hydro-meteorological events like droughts impacting agriculture and
allied activities. There were 32 districts in Tamil Nadu as on 2018, of which two districts
namely, Chennai and The Nilgiris have been omitted in this study because of lack of data
related to agriculture and dairy components. Therefore, the remaining 30 districts of Tamil
Nadu have been considered for the study. Agriculture is the major livelihood source for more
than 40 per cent of the state population. Most of the rural and low income communities are
mainly reliant on agriculture and allied activities for their livelihoods. Major rainfall season is
north-east monsoon. The state has tropical climate along with visible discrepancy between
summer and winter temperatures. High dependency on monsoon rains for recharging most of
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

its water resources direct towards severe water deficiency and drought in the state, if
monsoon failures occur. Also, high variability in crop and dairy production exist because of
uncertain climate in the state (GoI, 2015). Hence, this study has been undertaken to assess the
district level composite vulnerability to drought for the 30 districts of Tamil Nadu.

3.2. Data sources

Secondary data on different climate variables, crop as well as dairy production for the 30
districts of Tamil Nadu were selected based on the availability of data and extensive literature
review (Piya et al., 2016; Sridevi et al., 2014; Gizachew and Shimelis, 2014; Feroze et al.,
2014; Maiti et al., 2015; Varadan and Kumar, 2015; Rao et al., 2016; Sendhil et al., 2018).
Climate data such as district level rainfall and temperature data for a period of 30 years (1984
to 2013) from the IMD were collected. District level crop production data such as area and
yield of major crops cultivated across Tamil Nadu, net sown area, gross cropped area and
other crop related data for the past three agricultural years (2012-13 to 2014-15) were
collected from various authenticated reports published by the state government. District level
dairy production data for the same period were obtained from the Department of Animal
Husbandry and Veterinary Sciences report of Tamil Nadu and Livestock Census apart from
other official reports.

3.3. Vulnerability estimation

Vulnerability is the extent to which a system is prone to, or unable to cope with, adverse
effects of climate change, which includes climate variability and extremes. It is the function
of the character, magnitude and rate of climate variation to which a system is exposed, the
sensitivity and adaptive capacity. Exposure is the nature and degree to which a system is
exposed to climate change. Sensitivity is the degree to which a system is adversely affected
by climate change. Adaptive capacity is the capability of a production system or region to
better adjust to climate change (IPCC, 2007).

In Eq. (1), combination of exposure and sensitivity is called as ‘potential impact’, which is
very much harmful, if the region or production system has a high degree of index score.
Hence, vulnerability level of a region is the extent of potential impact over adaptive capacity
of that region or production system (Sendhil et al., 2018).
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

Accordingly, Eq. (1) can be rewritten as,

where,

3.4. Steps in vulnerability assessment

The following steps have been used to assess the district level composite vulnerability index
to drought.

3.4.1. Identification of suitable indicators

Selection of indicators is of utmost importance for any study on vulnerability assessment.
Hence, much care has been taken into consideration to finalize the variables under each
indicator by thorough review of published literature and discussion with experts to give the
apriori functional relationship (Table 1-3).

3.4.1.1. Indicators on exposure and functional relationship

Table 1 depicts the exposure indicator variables and their functional relationship. The
explanation for selected indicator variables is given in the following section.

a) Trend analysis for climatic variables

Trend analysis has been carried out using non-parametric Mann-Kendall’s test. This test is a
statistical method, which is widely used for studying the spatial variation and temporal trends
of climatic time series (Yue and Wang, 2004; Tabari et al., 2011; Mondal et al., 2012;
Vijayasarathy, 2013; Yadav et al., 2014; Sendhil et al., 2015; Sendhil et al., 2016). Thus,
coefficient of trend in minimum temperature, maximum temperature and precipitation of
kharif (July to October), rabi (November to February) and summer (March to June) seasons
have been calculated for the 30 years period spanning from 1984 to 2013. These indicators
have positive functional relationship with exposure (Sendhil et al., 2015; Sendhil et al., 2016;
Sendhil et al., 2018). If the selected variable coefficient increases, the exposure of the region
to drought vulnerability increases.

b) Percentage of years having slight, moderate and severe meteorological drought

As per the IMD, the particular year of a district is called as slight, moderate and severe
meteorological drought, if the year-wise rainfall deficit of the district is between 11-25, 26-50
 Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

and more than 50 per cent of normal rainfall, respectively (Maiti et al., 2015). Number of
years having slight, moderate and severe meteorological drought during the period 1984 to
2013 is divided separately by total number of years considered (30 years) gives respective
percentages for a particular district. Likewise, it has been calculated for all the districts.
These variables have positive functional relationship with exposure (Maiti et al., 2015; Rai et
al., 2017).

Table 1: Exposure indicators and their functional relationship

Functional References
Indicator Variables Unit
Relationship
Exposure Trend in kharif minimum temperature Coefficient of trend + Sendhil et al.
(2015); Sendhil
Trend in rabi minimum temperature Coefficient of trend + et al. (2016);
Sendhil et al.
Trend in summer minimum temperature Coefficient of trend +
(2018)
Trend in kharif maximum temperature Coefficient of trend +

Trend in rabi maximum temperature Coefficient of trend +

Trend in summer maximum temperature Coefficient of trend +
Trend in kharif precipitation Coefficient of trend +
Trend in rabi precipitation Coefficient of trend +
Trend in summer precipitation Coefficient of trend +

Percentage of years having slight meteorological % + Maiti et al.

drought (2015); Rai et al.
(2017)
Percentage of years having moderate % +
meteorological drought
Percentage of years having severe meteorological % +
drought
Percentage of years having 20 per cent less number % +
of rainy days than normal
Number of incidence of heat waves during 30 Number +
years period

c) Percentage of years having 20 per cent less number of rainy days than normal

If the rainfall of a particular day is 2.5 mm or high, then that day is called as rainy day. The
year-wise incidence of those rainy days is calculated during 1984 to 2013 and compared with
number of normal rainy days. If the year-wise incidences are less than 80 per cent of the
normal rainy days, then it is called as number of years having 20 per cent less number of
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

rainy days than normal (Maiti et al., 2015). If it is divided by total number of years, then
percentage of years having 20 per cent less number of rainy days than normal can be
obtained. The variable has positive functional relationship with the exposure (Maiti et al.,
2015; Rai et al., 2017).

d) Number of incidence of heat waves during 30 years period

IMD defines that if the maximum temperature at a grid point is 3°C or higher than the normal
temperature, successively for three days or more, then it is called as a ‘heat wave’ (Maiti et
al., 2015). The incidence of such heat waves is calculated from March to July months for 30
years period. This indicator has positive functional relationship with the exposure. Hence, if it
increases, exposure increases and vice-versa (Maiti et al., 2015; Rai et al., 2017).

3.4.1.2. Indicators on sensitivity and functional relationship

Sensitivity indicator variables and their functional relationship have been explained in Table
2. Indicators such as area of major crops to the total cropped area; share of gross unirrigated
area to gross sown area; share of bovine population to total livestock population; rural
population density (Gbetibouo and Ringler, 2009; Ravindranath et al., 2011; Rao et al.,
2016); and share of small & marginal farmers to total farmers have positive functional
relationship with the sensitivity. If those variables increase, then sensitivity increases, hence,
drought vulnerability increases. However, indicators like yield of major crops (Palanisami et
al., 2009 and 2010); yield of dairy animals; stage of ground water extraction (or
development); and average farm size (Gbetibouo and Ringler, 2009) show negative
functional relationship with sensitivity. If they increase, sensitivity declines, hence,
vulnerability decreases. The stage of ground water extraction (or development) is the ratio of
existing gross ground water extraction for all uses and annual extractable ground water
resources, which is expressed in percentage. The average of two years i.e., 2013 and 2017,
have been considered for calculating the stage of ground water extraction for each district. If
it increases, sensitivity declines (negative association), since it shows more ground water is
available for extraction.
 Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

Table 2: Sensitivity indicators and their functional relationship

Functional References
Indicator Variables Unit
Relationship
Sensitivity Area of major crops to the total cropped area % + Authors
inclusion based
on experts
opinion
Yield of major crops kg/ha - Palanisami et al.
(2009) and
(2010)
Share of gross unirrigated area to gross sown area % + Authors
inclusion based
Share of bovine population to total livestock % + on experts
population opinion
Yield of dairy animals Litre/animal -
Stage of ground water extraction (or development) % -
Average farm size ha - Gbetibouo and
Ringler (2009)
Rural population density Number of + Gbetibouo and
persons/sq. km Ringler (2009);
Ravindranath
et al. (2011); Rao
et al. (2016)
Share of small & marginal farmers to total farmers % + Authors
inclusion based
on experts
opinion

3.4.1.3. Indicators on adaptive capacity and functional relationship

Adaptive capacity indicator variables and their functional relationship have been explained in
Table 3. The explanation of those indicators is as follows:

a) Simpson index of crop diversification

The Simpson Index of Diversification (SID) was used for calculating diversification of crops
in a district (Varadan and Kumar, 2015; Basavaraj et al., 2016). The important crops of Tamil
Nadu such as paddy, sorghum, pearl millet, finger millet, maize, sugarcane, cotton,
groundnut, sesame, black gram, red gram, green gram and horse gram have been considered
to calculate the index. If this indicator increases, adaptive capacity increases (Varadan and
Kumar, 2015), hence, vulnerability to drought decreases.
 Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

where,
 represents the area under the crop
 represents the gross cropped area.

Table 3: Adaptive capacity indicators and their functional relationship

Functional References
Indicator Variables Unit
Relationship
Adaptive Crop diversification + Varadan and
Capacity Kumar (2015)
Share of net cultivated area to operational holdings % + Authors
inclusion based
on experts
opinion
Cropping intensity % + Palanisami et al.
(2009) and
(2010); Sridevi
et al. (2014);
Rai et al. (2017)
Irrigation intensity % + Palanisami et al.
(2009) and
(2010)
Literacy rate % + Palanisami et al.
(2009) and
(2010);
Gbetibouo and
Ringler (2009);
Gizachew and
Shimelis (2014)
Share of area under pasture & grazing land to gross sown % + Maiti et al.
area (2015)
Density of dairy animals Number of + Authors
animals/sq. km inclusion based
on experts
Share of indigenous population per 1000 bovine population Number + opinion
Proportion of area insured to gross sown area % +
Share of Gross District Domestic Product (GDDP) of % + Gbetibouo and
primary sector to its Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) Ringler (2009)
Number of Artificial Insemination (AI) centres per 1000 Number + Maiti et al.
adult female bovine (2015)
Number of Veterinary Institutions per 1000 bovine Number +
population
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

b) Cropping intensity index

Cropping intensity indicates the number of crops being cultivated from the same part of land
in an agricultural year. It can be calculated by computing the ratio between gross cropped
area and net sown area, which is expressed in percentage. This indicator has positive
functional relationship with adaptive capacity (Palanisami et al., 2009 and 2010; Sridevi et
al., 2014; Rai et al., 2017). Therefore, vulnerability declines. The formula for cropping
intensity is as follows:

Therefore, if cropping intensity is higher, then productivity per unit of arable land is also
higher (Varadan and Kumar, 2015).

c) Irrigation intensity index

Irrigation intensity is known as the percentage of the irrigation proposed to be irrigated in an
agricultural year. It can be calculated as ratio between gross area irrigated and net area
irrigated, which is expressed as percentage. This has positive functional relationship with
adaptive capacity (Palanisami et al., 2009 and 2010). If it increases, adaptive capacity
increases vice-versa.

d) Other indicators
The other indicators such as share of net cultivated area to operational holdings; literacy rate
(Palanisami et al., 2009 and 2010; Gbetibouo and Ringler, 2009; Gizachew and Shimelis,
2014); share of area under pasture & grazing land to gross sown area (Maiti et al., 2015);
density of dairy animals; share of indigenous population per 1000 bovine population;
proportion of area insured to gross sown area; share of Gross District Domestic Product
(GDDP) of primary sector to its GSDP (Gbetibouo and Ringler, 2009); number of Artificial
Insemination (AI) centres per 1000 adult female bovine (Maiti et al., 2015); and number of
veterinary institutions per 1000 bovine population (Maiti et al., 2015) have positive
functional relationship with the adaptive capacity. If coefficient of the variables increases,
adaptive capacity increases. Hence, vulnerability to drought declines.
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

3.4.2. Normalization
Normalization of the indicators has to be done in order to make sure that all the indicators are
comparable owing to measurement on different scales for each indicator (Vincent, 2004;
Varadan and Kumar, 2015; Kale et al., 2016; Kumar et al., 2016; Ponnusamy et al., 2016;
Mahida and Sendhil, 2017; Sendhil et al., 2018). For the indicators having positive functional
relationship with their respective index, then the normalization has been done with the
following equation.

On the other hand, if negative functional relationship occurs, then the following equation has
been used for normalization.

3.4.3. Assignment of weights to indicators

After normalizing the indicators, weights were assigned based on their level of influence on
vulnerability. There are four methods to assign weights to the indicators such as equal
weights, inverse of variance, expert opinion and principal component analysis (PCA). Each
method has its own advantages and disadvantages (Varadan and Kumar, 2015; Sendhil et al.,
2018). However, PCA is the most widely used technique to assign weights with the
assumption of linear relationship existing among the variables (Kaiser, 1960; Ayyoob et al.,
2013; Rana et al., 2015; Kale et al., 2016; Mahida and Sendhil, 2017; Sendhil et al., 2018).
Therefore, PCA method has been adopted in this study. The functional formulation is as
follows:

Where,
 indicates the -dimensional vector of variables influencing vulnerability
 represents the common factor
 represents the factor loading
 represents the associated idiosyncratic error-term of order
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

The weights from the PCA were calculated with the following equation.

where,
 represents the weight of the variable
 represents the Eigen value of the factor
 represents the loading value of the variable on factor

3.4.4. Composite drought vulnerability index

Exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity indices were calculated separately by using their
respective indicators along with their respective calculated weights in the following equation
(Sendhil et al., 2018).

where,
 represents the normalized value of variable
 is the weight of variable

Finally, Composite drought vulnerability index (CDVI) was calculated as per the IPCC
approach, using Eq. (1).

3.4.5. Categorization of districts

Based on the computed CDVI, the districts in Tamil Nadu were categorized as high,
moderate and low using mean and standard deviation (SD) norm (Ayyoob et al., 2013; Rana
et al., 2015; Kale et al., 2016; Sendhil et al., 2018). The categorization is as follows:

 High = Index > (Mean + 0.5 SD)

 Moderate = (Mean – 0.5 SD) < Index < (Mean + 0.5 SD)
 Low = Index < (Mean – 0.5 SD)
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

4. Results and discussion

4.1. Exposure
Exposure index for 30 districts of Tamil Nadu is presented in Table 4 using meteorological
indicators. The highest exposure to drought was observed in Coimbatore (0.58), while lowest
was found in Krishnagiri (0.35) with the mean index of 0.47 and SD of 0.06. A less
divergence (difference between maximum index value and minimum index value) of 0.22 has
been observed in exposure among districts, which shows that almost all the districts
experienced similar exposure to selected meteorological indicators. Ten districts such as
Coimbatore, Kancheepuram, Villupuram, Cuddalore, Thiruvarur, Thanjavur, Theni,
Nagapattinam, Dindigul, and Tiruvannamalai were categorized under high exposure; eleven
districts such as Thiruvallur, Ariyalur, Vellore, Pudukkottai, Madurai, Ramanathapuram,
Tiruchirappalli, Thoothukudi, Sivaganga, Perambalur, and Kanyakumari as moderate
exposure; and nine districts namely Tiruppur, Karur, Salem, Virudhunagar, Erode,
Tirunelveli, Namakkal, Dharmapuri, and Krishnagiri were under low exposure category.
Regional exposure indicates explicitly that many districts in north eastern, Cauvery delta and
southern agro-climatic zones of Tamil Nadu fall under high to moderate exposure to drought.
This may be due to erratic temperature and precipitation (Varadan and Kumar, 2015); high
percentage of years having 20 per cent less number of rainy days than normal, more number
of years having meteorological droughts and moderate incident of heat waves. However,
most of the districts in western and north western zones have come under less exposure
because of low percentage of years having 20 per cent less number of rainy days than normal
and less number of years having meteorological droughts. The highest weightage was
observed in coefficient of trend in summer maximum temperature (6.18), which is the crucial
exposure indicator for drought assessment, while lowest was found in percentage of years
having slight meteorological drought (2.90), which reduces vulnerability index among the
indicators taken for estimating the exposure.

4.2. Sensitivity
Sensitivity index for 30 districts of Tamil Nadu (Table 4) revealed that it was highest in
Kancheepuram (0.69) and lowest was in Tiruppur (0.26) with a mean index of 0.58 and SD of
0.11. A high divergence of 0.43 has been found in sensitivity due to its wider range among all
the districts. About twelve districts were categorized as highly sensitive, twelve districts as
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

moderately sensitive and six districts as less sensitive. Most of the districts in north eastern,
Cauvery delta, north western and southern zones have come under high to moderate sensitive.

Table 4: Exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity and composite drought vulnerability index
for the districts of Tamil Nadu

District Exposure Sensitivity Adaptive Capacity Composite

Vulnerability
Index Category Index Category Index Category Index Category
Ariyalur 0.49 M 0.69 H 0.34 M 0.83 H
Coimbatore 0.58 H 0.29 L 0.31 L 0.56 L
Cuddalore 0.52 H 0.69 H 0.46 H 0.75 H
Dharmapuri 0.35 L 0.59 M 0.41 H 0.54 L
Dindigul 0.50 H 0.51 L 0.38 M 0.63 M
Erode 0.41 L 0.36 L 0.33 L 0.45 L
Kancheepuram 0.56 H 0.69 H 0.38 M 0.88 H
Kanyakumari 0.44 M 0.57 M 0.44 H 0.57 L
Karur 0.42 L 0.43 L 0.27 L 0.58 L
Krishnagiri 0.35 L 0.61 M 0.38 M 0.57 L
Madurai 0.48 M 0.63 M 0.31 L 0.79 H
Nagapattinam 0.50 H 0.68 H 0.52 H 0.66 M
Namakkal 0.38 L 0.54 M 0.41 H 0.51 L
Perambalur 0.44 M 0.62 M 0.26 L 0.80 H
Pudukkottai 0.48 M 0.68 H 0.37 M 0.79 H
Ramanathapuram 0.47 M 0.64 H 0.34 M 0.77 H
Salem 0.42 L 0.55 M 0.44 H 0.52 L
Sivaganga 0.46 M 0.64 H 0.29 L 0.81 H
Thanjavur 0.52 H 0.64 H 0.43 H 0.73 M
Theni 0.50 H 0.46 L 0.35 M 0.61 L
Thiruvallur 0.49 M 0.67 H 0.42 H 0.74 H
Thiruvarur 0.52 H 0.68 H 0.51 H 0.69 M
Thoothukudi 0.46 M 0.55 M 0.34 M 0.67 M
Tiruchirappalli 0.46 M 0.62 M 0.34 M 0.74 H
Tirunelveli 0.39 L 0.57 M 0.31 L 0.65 M
Tiruppur 0.44 L 0.26 L 0.24 L 0.46 L
Tiruvannamalai 0.50 H 0.61 M 0.40 M 0.70 M
Vellore 0.49 M 0.65 H 0.38 M 0.76 H
Villupuram 0.54 H 0.64 H 0.42 H 0.76 H
Virudhunagar 0.41 L 0.57 M 0.27 L 0.72 M
Mean 0.47 0.58 0.37 0.68
Standard Deviation 0.06 0.11 0.07 0.11
(SD)
Note: H = High, M = Moderate and L = Low.
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

The probable reason might be due to higher the area share of major crops, more is the
sensitive to drought (Varadan and Kumar, 2015). Same is the case in average farm size, share
of bovine population, rural population density (Ravindranath et al., 2011) and share of small
and marginal farmers. However, the increase in yield of major crops, stage of ground water
extraction and yield of dairy animals could not save these districts from high sensitivity.
Conversely, many districts in western zone are less sensitive due to less of the aforesaid
variables despite higher yield of major crops. It is also evident that the highly sensitive
districts like Kancheepuram, Cuddalore, Thiruvarur, Nagapattinam, Villupuram and
Thanjavur have also been identified under high exposure category. Hence, remedial measures
must be taken to reduce the exposure and sensitivity of the regions to drought. However,
districts like Karur, Erode and Tiruppur were classified under both less exposure and less
sensitive category, which is a good indication. The highest sensitivity weightage was found in
the case of average farm size (4.05) whereas, least was observed in yield of major crops
(2.43).

4.3. Adaptive capacity

Adaptive capacity index for 30 districts of Tamil Nadu is depicted in Table 4. The highest
adaptive capacity was found in Nagapattinam (0.52), while lowest was observed in Tiruppur
(0.24) with a mean index of 0.37 and SD of 0.07. A divergence of 0.28 has been observed in
adaptive capacity. About ten districts were classified as highly adaptive to drought, eleven
districts as moderately adaptive and nine districts possess low adaptive capacity. Most of the
districts in Cauvery delta, north eastern and north western zones have come under high to
moderate adaptive capacity. The plausible reason is because of higher values of cropping
intensity, irrigation intensity, literacy rate (Gizachew and Shimelis, 2014), percentage of area
insured, number of AI centers (Maiti et al., 2015) and veterinary institutions (Maiti et al.,
2015). However, many districts in western and southern zones are between moderate to low
adaptive capacity due to less of aforementioned variables; despite higher value in crop
diversification coupled with more or less equal in share of net cultivated area, area under
pasture and grazing land, density of dairy animals and share of agriculture & allied sector
income. Further, the increase in indigenous population per 1000 bovine population could not
save southern zone districts from their category of less adaptive capacity. The variable having
highest weightage was cropping intensity (4.71), which tends to increase the adaptive
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

capacity of the farmers, while lowest weightage was found in the case of share of area under
pasture and grazing land to gross sown area (2.29).

4.4. Inter-index values of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity

Inter-index values of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity showed a huge difference
(Fig.1). Sensitivity index was higher than exposure and adaptive capacity for all the districts
except Coimbatore, Erode, Theni and Tiruppur. In those four districts, exposure to drought
vulnerability was higher in comparison to other two dimensions. The districts such as
Dharmapuri, Krishnagiri, Nagapattinam, Namakkal and Salem have higher adaptive capacity
than exposure but less sensitivity. On the other hand, Coimbatore has shown higher adaptive
capacity than sensitivity but lower exposure to drought. Among exposure, sensitivity and
adaptive capacity to drought, shockingly, none of the districts registered higher index with
respect to adaptive capacity. In all districts either sensitivity or exposure was holding the
highest position. The analysis on inter-index comparison showed that all the districts have
less adaptive capacity, but with more sensitivity and exposure put together implying the study
region is more prone to drought.

Fig.1. Radar pictorial of sensitivity, exposure and adaptive capacity indices

Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

4.5. Composite drought vulnerability index

The CDVI was computed using exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity indices (Table 4).
It revealed a wide divergence (0.43) in CDVI magnitude with a mean index of 0.68 and SD
of 0.11. Lowest vulnerability to drought was observed in Erode (0.45), followed by Tiruppur
(0.46) and Namakkal (0.51), while the vulnerability level to drought was highest in
Kancheepuram (0.88), followed by Ariyalur (0.83) and Sivaganga (0.81). Moderate
vulnerability to drought was observed in Thanjavur (0.73), followed by Virudhunagar (0.72)
and Tiruvannamalai (0.70). About twelve districts were categorized as highly vulnerable to
drought; eight districts as moderately vulnerable; and ten districts as less vulnerable. The
highest potential impact (sum of exposure and sensitivity) was observed in Kancheepuram
(1.25), followed by Cuddalore (1.21) and Thiruvarur (1.20), while the potential impact was
lowest in Tiruppur (0.70), followed by Erode (0.77) and Karur (0.85). Lowest vulnerability to
drought in Erode was mainly due to its less exposure (0.41) coupled with less sensitivity
(0.36), which results in second lowest potential impact of 0.77 against its low adaptive
capacity (0.33). In the case of Tiruppur, the lowest potential impact (0.70) coupled with low
adaptive capacity (0.24) were the main reasons behind its second lowest position with respect
to vulnerability to drought (0.46). However, in the case of Namakkal, its high adaptive
capacity (0.41) along with low potential impact (0.92) resulted in third lowest position among
vulnerable districts to drought (0.51). While considering the highly vulnerable districts to
drought, Kancheepuram positioned the highest owing to its highest sensitivity index (0.69)
and second highest exposure index (0.56), which led to highest potential impact
(0.69+0.56=1.25) along with moderate adaptive capacity (0.38). This is because of highest
exposure weightage for the variable, trend in summer maximum temperature (6.18), followed
by trends in rabi (5.41) and summer minimum temperature (5.38). In the case of sensitivity
indicator for Kancheepuram, the variable, share of small & marginal farmers to total farmers
influenced the index with 3.36 points weight, followed by share of bovine population to total
livestock population (3.30) and average farm size (3.05). In the case of Ariyalur, the second
highest vulnerable district to drought was due to its moderate exposure (0.49) and high
sensitivity (0.69) resulting in high potential impact of (0.49+0.69=1.18) but with moderate
adaptive capacity (0.34). In the case of Sivaganga, the third highest vulnerable district to
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

drought was due to its high potential impact estimated at 1.10 (sum of moderate exposure of
0.46 and high sensitivity of 0.64) but with a low adaptive capacity (0.29).

4.6. Mapping of districts

Based on the categorization of districts as furnished in Table 4, the composite drought
vulnerability mapping was done for different districts accordingly (Fig. 2).

Fig.2. Mapping of drought vulnerability in Tamil Nadu

Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

Table 5: Agro-climatic zone wise classification of drought vulnerability

Agro-climatic zone Categories of drought vulnerability

High Moderate Low

North eastern zone Kancheepuram, Tiruvannamalai --

Thiruvallur, Vellore,
Villupuram and part of
Cuddalore

North western zone -- -- Dharmapuri,

Krishnagiri, salem and
part of Namakkal

Western zone Perambalur and part of Dindigul Theni, Erode,

Ariyalur Coimbatore, Tiruppur,
parts of Namakkal and
Karur
Cauvery delta zone Pudukkottai, Thanjavur, Part of Karur
Tiruchirappalli, parts of Nagapattinam and
Ariyalur and Cuddalore Thiruvarur
Southern zone Madurai, Sivaganga and Virudhunagar, --
Ramanathapuram Tirunelveli and
Thoothukudi

High rainfall zone -- -- Kanyakumari

Hilly zone* -- Kodaikanal (Dindigul) --

Note:*The Nilgiris from hilly zone is omitted due to lack of data.

Tamil Nadu has seven agro-climatic zones, namely, north eastern zone, north western zone,
western zone, Cauvery delta zone, southern zone, high rainfall zone and hilly zone. As it can
be seen from Fig. 2 and Table 5, a majority of the districts in north eastern and southern
zones; a few districts in Cauvery delta and western zones have come under high vulnerable
category, whereas most of the districts in north western, western and high rainfall zones are
less vulnerable to drought. The moderate vulnerable category consists of more districts in
Cauvery delta and southern zones; one district each in north eastern zone (Tiruvannamalai),
western zone (Dindigul) and hilly zone (Kodaikanal of Dindigul district). The result also
indicated that all districts in north eastern, southern and Cauvery delta zones (except part of
Karur); some districts in western zone are at risk, as these districts are located in either high
or moderate drought vulnerable categories. This may be due to high exposure and high
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

sensitivity along with inadequate adaptive capacity response to drought vulnerability as

induced by climate change. Conversely, all the districts in north western and high rainfall
zones along with a majority of the districts in western zone are less vulnerable. This is
because, these regions have less exposure and sensitivity to drought coupled with adequate
adaptive capacity.

5. Conclusions
Drought has become a major problem globally affecting crop and dairy production. In India,
Tamil Nadu is one of the most vulnerable states to various hydro-meteorological events such
as drought impacting agriculture and allied activities. Hence, this study has been attempted to
compute new composite drought vulnerability index (CDVI) comprising indicators of both
crop and dairy enterprises for 30 districts of Tamil Nadu. The index helps in identification of
the districts under different vulnerability category to drought. It was developed using
exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity comprising various indicators. The results of the
study revealed that highest exposure was observed in Coimbatore, followed by
Kancheepuram and Villupuram, while Krishnagiri registered the lowest exposure, followed
by Dharmapuri and Namakkal. Sensitivity was highest in Kancheepuram, followed by
Cuddalore and Ariyalur, while it was lowest in Tiruppur, followed by Coimbatore and Erode.
The highest adaptive capacity was found in Nagapattinam, followed by Thiruvarur and
Cuddalore, while lowest was observed in Tiruppur, followed by Perambalur and
Virudhunagar. The overall analysis indicated that Kancheepuram is highly vulnerable to
drought, followed by Ariyalur and Sivaganga, while lowest vulnerability to drought was
observed in Erode, followed by Tiruppur and Namakkal. Vulnerability mapping indicated
that most of the districts fall under north eastern and southern agro-climatic zones; a few
districts in Cauvery delta and western zones which were prone to high vulnerability. A
majority of the districts in north western, western and high rainfall zones were less
vulnerable, whereas the remaining districts of Tamil Nadu were identified under moderate
vulnerable to drought category. To mitigate the ill-effects due to drought, focus should be
given for developing regional level adaptation strategies and coping mechanisms like water
conserving techniques and/or farm ponds. Further, appropriate policy decisions like mass
adoption of micro irrigation at famers’ field have to be implemented for safeguarding the
livelihoods of people who are dependent on agriculture and dairy farming. Also,
Cite as:
Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
Adesh Kumar Sharma, (2020), “Development of Composite Vulnerability Index and District
Level Mapping of Climate Change Induced Drought in Tamil Nadu, India”, Ecological
Indicators, 113, pp. 106197 . DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2020.106197

identification and popularization of validated indigenous practices followed by local people

and their understandings about drought may be given special attention in order to lessen the
adverse effect of drought.

Acknowledgements
The first author duly thanks the University Grants Commission, New Delhi, India for the
financial assistance provided in the form of fellowship. The authors acknowledge for the
support and infrastructure facilities rendered by the Director, ICAR-National Dairy Research
Institute, Karnal, Haryana, India for carrying out the research; and ADG (MR), National
Climate Centre, IMD, Pune, India for providing climate data. The authors also thank the
anonymous referees for their constructive and useful comments, which helped to improve the
quality of the research article.

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Balaganesh G, Ravinder Malhotra, Sendhil R, Smita Sirohi, Sanjit Maiti, Ponnusamy K and
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