Climate Change in the Himalayas: Vulnerability and Resilience of Biodiversity and Forest Ecosystems

Professor Kumar, a distinguished environmentalist and hydrologist, has been recognized among the top 2% of global scientists for three consecutive years (2022–2024). His research spans diverse areas, including the sources, fate, and transport of carbon across water, air, and soil, as well as greenhouse gas emissions from reservoirs, lakes, and forests. Prof. Kumar earned his M.Tech and Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Roorkee, supported by an MHRD fellowship. He furthered his academic journey with postdoctoral research at Hohai University, College of Hydrology and Water Resources, China. Currently, he is a professor at Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology and works with the School of Hydrology and Water Resources. Throughout his illustrious career, Professor Kumar has edited five books and published over 150 peer-reviewed research and review articles in prestigious international journals. He has also participated in numerous international training programs and conferences, receiving fellowships from prominent organizations, including ICAR, ETH Zurich, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MOEF), and DAAD. In addition to his academic contributions, Prof. Kumar serves as an honorary Associate Editor for Frontiers in Environmental Science, Frontiers in Microbiology, International Journal of River Basin Management (Taylor & Francis), and Weather, Climate, & Society. He is also an advisory board member for Ecological Indicators (Elsevier). Professor Kumar has successfully led two Young Scientist projects, one consultancy project, and a project funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), further cementing his reputation as a leader in the field.

Dr. Wil De Jong studied forestry at Wageningen Agricultural University, in the Netherlands. He moved to the tropics in 1982 to explore the role of forests in people’s lives. He worked in Peru for seven years, spent four years at the New York Botanical Garden’s Institute of Economic Botany and then three years as a post-doc in West Kalimantan Indonesia. In 1995 he joined the Center for International Forestry Research where he worked for 10 years before moving to Japan. He was professor at the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka and since 2006 joined Kyoto University’s Center for Integrated Area Studies and later CSEAS. His research is on tropical forest governance and policies, smallholder and community forestry, forest and climate change, forest restoration and forest transition. He has undertaken research in Bolivia, Peru, Indonesia, Vietnam, India and China, and has 160 published titles to his name. Since 2021 he was appointed Emeritus Professor at Kyoto University.

Dr. Munesh Kumar is an Associate Professor in the Department of Forestry & Natural Resources at the Uttarakhand campus of H.N.B. Garhwal University. His research interests include forestry, Himalayan biodiversity, climate change, carbon sequestration, and carbon fluxes. He is a guest editor for Land and Frontiers in Environmental Science.

Dr. Rajiv Pandey is a Senior Scientist and the Head of the Division of Forestry Statistics for the Indian Council of Forestry Research & Education, Dehradun. He has held this position for more than 23 years. Over this time, he has dedicated his work for understanding the non-linearity of natural resources to society and impacts of climate change, in addition to teaching research methodology and climate change. He is a member of the Editorial Board for Ecological Indicators and a co-editor for Frontiers in Climate Risk Management.