ABSTRACT

The Western Ghats with spatial extent of 1, 64,280 km2 (<5% of India’s geographical area) is a chain of hills with undulating terrains running in the North-South direction for about 1600 km parallel to the Arabian Sea from river Tapti (22˚26’N) to Kanyakumari (about 8˚0’ N). The region with exceptional biodiversity of endemic flora and fauna: 4,600 species of flowering plants with 38% endemics, 330 butterflies with 11% endemics, 156 reptiles with 62% endemics, 508 birds with 4% endemics, 120 mammals with 12% endemics, 289 fishes with 41% endemics and 135 amphibians with 75% endemics (http://wgbis.ces.iisc.ernet.in/biodiversity/pubs/ces_tr/TR122/index.htm), is one among 35 global biodiversity hotspots. The rich biodiversity coupled with higher endemism is due to the humid tropical climate, topographical and geological characteristics, and geographical isolation (Arabian Sea to the west and the semiarid Deccan Plateau to the east).  The Western Ghats forms an important watershed for the entire peninsular India, being the source of 37 west flowing rivers and three major east flowing rivers and their numerous tributaries. These fragile ecosystems are extremely important for the existence of humankind from the point of productivity, revenue generation, employment potential and subsistence. This necessitates sustainable natural resources management by considering ecological, hydrological, climatic, economic, and social perspectives. An interactive web-based spatial information with the decision support system by integrating heterogeneous spatial information with attribute details aids in good governance while ensuring transparency and dissemination of decisions to all stakeholders. Geovisualization of natural processes and phenomenon through synthesis and integration of information would meet scientific and societal needs through real world knowledge construction. Web based spatial decision support system (WSDSS) is designed by integrating free and open source softwares (Geoserver, PostgreSQL, GeoTools, Openlayers) and integration of spatial information of Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards to carry out a multiple criteria analysis.  Features such as Web Map Service (WMS), Web Feature Service (WFS) and Web Coverage Service (WCS) would help in accomplishing effective knowledge dissemination with ecological, socio, economic and environmental perspectives. Integration of spatio-temporal information data with algorithmic techniques facilitate visualization in order to analyze decision problems through exploratory analysis based on multiple criteria to obtain historical, statistical analysis and aid by enabling a detailed comparative analysis of the alternatives. Geo visualization enables enumerating current scenario, visualizing alternate scenario, while predicting likely changes with different agents, which is essential for effective decision making towards sustainable management of natural resources.

KEY WORDS:Geo-visualization, Web based Spatial decision support system, Western Ghats, Biodiversity, Ecology.