IMPACT OF CLIMATE ON VEGETATION INDICES OVER RAINFED DISTRICTS OF UTTARAKHAND, INDIA

Abstract. Due to a change in the landscape, the climate of Uttarakhand state is changing rapidly, impacting the weather, further affecting human beings and vegetation. Nowadays, remote sensing is a favorable tool for monitoring the vegetation condition using NDVI and EVI. Studying the relationship between vegetation and climate more extensively, it is necessary to better understand the anomaly of ecosystems with climate change. This study is carried out to evaluate the vegetation cover dynamics by establishing the association between climate parameters and vegetation indices over the rain-fed districts (Nainital, Bageshwar, Champawat, Dehradun) of Uttarakhand for the period of 20 years. In this study, Google Earth Engine (GEE) is used to extract the MODIS NDVI and EVI at 250 m spatial resolution & 16-day temporal resolution data. The climate parameters for the rain-fed district (study area) are extracted from Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) Pun website for the period from 2000 to 2020. According to the annual vegetation dynamics, the peak attained by both indices is during the monsoon season, and hence they both show identical patterns to each other. Linear Regression Analysis results show a strong impact of climate on vegetation. Both indices shows a positive correlation with climate parameters where minimum temperature and rainfall are strongly correlated with EVI. Thus, the study reveals that EVI is proven to be more appropriate indices for monitoring vegetation cover as compared to NDVI for the study area.