INTRODUCTION

Natural resource management and decision making has become increasingly important with the growing population and changing consumption patterns. The consumption rate of natural resources has increased considerably to about 60 billion tons of raw materials a year during the last 30 years [1]. Unplanned developmental activities coupled with the uncontrolled resource exploitations has stressed the resource availability, biodiversity and ecosystem [2, 3], evident from barren hill tops, and the decline in quantity and duration of water flow in streams and rivers. Natural resources management would be effective with the active participation of all stakeholders with formalize and rationalize decisions. This has necessitated integrating heterogeneous data, making them available to the various stakeholders to allow them to make more informed decisions. Systematic conservation planning is a vital tool for protecting the nature around the world. Ecosystem based management (EBM) of land resources integrating ecological, social, and economic objectives [4], recognizes human dimensions as key functional components of the ecosystem and natural resource management [5, 6]. Integration of multiple criteria considering spatio-temporal aspects would help in the effective decision making. Multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA) offers structured and systematic decision support through consideration of multiple factors and their value judgements and relative importance of factors [7, 8], which are essential for sustainable management of natural resources. However, non-spatial MCDA with large volumes of complex data has limitations in dynamic applications, which necessitates the design of spatial decision support system with the support for exploration, evaluation and optimal management. Spatial decision support systems (SDSS) aid in organizing, analyzing, modifying, and re-evaluating spatial information for planning activities.
Geovisualization with capabilities of geographical information system (GIS) based MCDA [9] helps in providing dynamic links among maps, tables, and statistical charts to discover new relationships in the data which seeks to dynamically synthesize spatial and non-spatial information in integrated [10]. It focuses on improving public access to geospatial data and maps, providing possibilities for participatory learning and analysis by the general public, in planning and decision making. Use of thematic or topographic maps as background information aid in spatial decision making [11, 12] and also landscape visualization for communicating spatial scenarios for effective understanding of a decision problem [13]. Integrating SDSS with Geo-visualization helps in visualizing the spatial decisions for conservation planning and natural resource management requires ecological, economic, and social perspectives [14]. A web based spatial decision support system (WSDSS) helps in identification and framing of a problem, exploratory development of alternatives, selection of evaluative criteria, aggregation and weighting of impacts of decision options. The recent advancement to explore future options via 2D mapping (GIS), 3D spatial visualization (WSDSS) and scenario development allows people to link web GIS to a realistic 3D model for visualizing environmental effects of land use changes [15]. The objectives of this communication are:

1. To design a web based spatial decision support system (WSDSS), which supports an exploration and visualization of spatial decision making with free and open source tools.
2. Integrating exploratory analysis and evaluation phases in the decision making process to attain transparent and interactive system with MCDA.