Management of Common Property Resources: A Study of Deepor Beel Ramsar Site, Assam

Wetlands are considered the most valuable ecosystem on earth. However due to improper management and uses, often they are treated as wastelands. An attempt has been undertaken in this paper to highlight the importance of wetlands as a common property resource. Spatio-temporal study of the Deepor Beel Ramsar site has been carried out to study access to the dynamics of the wetland. The study highlights how the wetland area is shrinking and has fragmented over time owing to the rapid change in land use and land cover in the catchment area. Urbanization has not only reduced the wetland area but also resulted in degradation in terms of water quality and biodiversity; even extinction of wetlands altogether