Geospatial assessment of ecological vulnerability of fragile Eastern Duars Forest integrating GIS-based AHP, CRITIC and AHP-TOPSIS models

Abstract

Assessment of the ecological vulnerability of regional forests is extremely vital for easing the struggle for forest conservation. Therefore, the present study aims to delve into the ecological vulnerability of the Eastern Duars forest in the Indian sub-Himalayan region. The study employs three cutting-edge multi-criteria decision-making methods, including AHP, CRITIC, and AHP-TOPSIS methods, in which geo-environmental (elevation, slope, soil texture), hydro-meteorological (precipitation, temperature, waterbodies), vegetation index and anthropogenic (land use land cover, road, settlement) criteria are integrated, to assess ecological vulnerability. The vulnerability maps indicate that very high vulnerable areas comprise 0.05%, 0.01%, 23.96%, high vulnerable 19.72%, 17.51%, 41.52%, moderate vulnerable 63.45%, 49.66%, 29.49%, low vulnerable 16.70%, 30.82%, 4.10% and very low vulnerable 0.08%, 2.02%, 0.92% of area as per AHP, CRITIC, and AHP-TOPSIS method respectively. The highly vulnerable region is found in human-modified areas, where anthropogenic activities disrupt the natural ecological process, and deforestation is evident. Hence, careful strategic policies should be enforced regarding the restriction of anthropogenic activities, human habitation expansion, and changing climate to sustain the fragile Duars forest ecosystem. The inclusion of objective and hybrid criteria weighting methods, along with predominant knowledge-driven subjective weighting method, will promote the practice of comprehensive ecological vulnerability assessment.