Analyzing the Influence of Land Use Land Cover Dynamics on Groundwater Reserves in Mymensingh Sadar Region through Remote Sensing and GIS Techniques

Land use land cover (LULC) changes are inherently spatial and dynamic with high spatiotemporal variability resulted from complex human-environmental interactions. Current extents, rates and intensities of LULC changes are driving unprecedented changes in ecosystems functions and environmental processes at local, regional and global scales. The study was conducted to assess LULC changes and its drivers using remote sensing (RS) and geographic information system (GIS) in Gojeb River Catchment, Ethiopia. The satellite images at different reference years (1978, 1987, 2001 and 2015) were obtained from Landsat images. Supervised classification with maximum likelihood algorithm was applied for image processing and change analysis. The LULC classes identified were cropland, forestland, shrubland, swamp, and woodland. The study found that the catchment has undergone significant LULC changes. The major changes were expansion of cropland at the expense of other LULC classes at the rate of 29.56% in 1978, 38.91% in 1987, 46.62% in 2001 and 52.74% in 2015. It has gained about 160,736.08 ha with an annual average increment of 4,344.22 ha. Conversely, forestland has undergone reductions at an annual rate of 9,030.0 ha between 1978 and 1987. The conversions of other classes to cropland are mainly associated with more demand for crop production. On the other hand, the conversion of relevant part of forest land to other classes could be due to vegetation degradation. Hence, the conversion of forestland to other land use classes could be attributed to the highly demand of agricultural land, firewood, charcoal, timbers and housing materials. The major driving forces which should be considered in sustainable watershed management were population growth and government induced settlements. Provision of modern alternative sources of energy, agricultural inputs and promoting non-agricultural sectors are also other considerations for the community sustainable livelihood. It is critical to follow holistic view and management of the catchment for successful integrated watershed management endeavours.

Climate change and land use land cover (LULC) changes are recognised as two of the most significant causes of environmental change. Climate change and LULC changes are related to one another. Land use change may drive climate change, and a changing climate may result in land cover changes. Climate change and LULC changes are believed to influence soil erosion. This chapter analyses the impacts of climate and LULC changes on soil erosion. The causes and effects of climate change on precipitation, temperature, solar radiation, atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and radiative forcing are discussed. The chapter includes the impacts of climate change on soil characteristics, vegetation cover, runoff, floods, and droughts and extends the impacts of these changes on water and wind erosion. The chapter explores the human alterations of LULC changes in terms of changes in the forest cover, alterations in agricultural lands, increase in urban areas, and decrease in wetland areas. The influence of the LULC changes on soil erosion and sediment production processes is discussed. Also, the combined impact of climate and LULC changes on soil erosion is explored, and mitigation strategies like sustainable land management practices and appropriate policy incentives to conserve soil are discussed.

Quantification of Land Use Land Cover (LULC) change influence river basin on hydrology will enable local government and policy makers to formulate and implement effective and appropriate strategies to minimize the effect of future LULC change. In this research Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) with Sequential Uncertainty Fitting Intervals (SUFI-2) was used for analyzing the LULC changes on the Water balance of Katar and Meki River Basins, in the Rift Valley of Ethiopia. LULC map of 1996 and 2014 was used for the change analysis and the results revealed that the reduction of Forest and expansion of Agriculture and Built-up areas have an influence on the surface water spatial distribution and the water balance components. During the land use change periods, the increment of annual surface runoff from 67.54 mm to 129.14 mm has resulted from Katar river basin and 40.64 mm to 59.56 mm has resulted from Meki river basins. This result has revealed that the above land use changes are the main contributors to the increment of surface runoff on both river basins. With this regard, major changes from the Forested region on both river basins have resulted in runoff depth increment. Forexample, runoff depth increment of 4-53 mm to 10-65 mm on Katar river basin and 2-34 mm to 23-60 mm range from Meki river basin mainly from forested regions resulted. Therefore, LULC change is becoming a serious threat to Katar and Meki river basin, hence appropriate measures should have to be taken for the stabilization of the land cover change with the regional development plan. Furthermore, the outcome of this study serves for policymakers as a valuable information for the planning of best land management strategies and priorities for the region.

<p>Human activities and climate affect the hydrology of a basin. The effect of Land Use Land Cover (LULC) change and climate change on streamflow are basin specific. In this study, an attempt has been made to evaluate the effects of LULC and climate change on streamflow in the Netravathi basin, Karnataka, India. The SWAT model, which reasonably simulates the streamflow of a basin, is used for this study. The analysis was done from the year 1990 to 2018. The watershed is delineated by using ALOS PALSAR DEM. Rainfall and temperature obtained from IMD are used as the climate variables. LULC maps were prepared using Landsat images of 1990 and 2018 in order to assess the LULC changes in the basin. The results showed that the spatial extent of the LULC classes of built-up (3.82%–6.51%), water bodies (0.76%–0.99%), and agriculture (11.96%–17.89%) increased, whereas that of forest (66.56%–51.7%), fallow (3.82%–6.13%), and barren land (13.07%–16.76%) decreased from 1990 to 2018. The streamflow increased steadily (5.02%) with changes in LULC from 1990 to 2018. The results indicate that LULC changes in urbanisation and agricultural intensification have contributed to the increase in runoff, in the catchment during this period. Thus, hydrological modelling integrating climate change and LULC can be used as an effective tool in estimating streamflow of the basin.</p>

Understanding the impacts of Land Use and Land Cover (LULC) changes and their drivers is crucial for sustainable management of natural resources. Thus, this rigorous study aimed to examine the trends, drivers, and consequences of land use land cover changes (LULC) in the Lake Ziway catchment, central rift valley of Ethiopia. The study followed a mixed- methodological systematic and justified approach that included remote sensing and GIS techniques, household surveys, focus group discussions, and in-depth interviews. The rigorous study shows that the conversion of forest land into agricultural and settlement lands is the major detected LULC change over the last 30 years in the catchment. Cultivated land has increased by 40.60% and settlement and plantation lands have increased by 61.54% and 60%, respectively. On the other hand, forest land decreased by 54.85% and grazing land have decreased by 15.85% respectively. Water bodies and wetlands have also decreased by 8.70% and 19.32% area coverage, respectively. Both the direct and indirect driving forces of the LULC changes were identified. The study also indicates that the participation of local communities in watershed management is low. The study further indicates that LULC changes observed in the Lake Ziway Catchment had statistically and practically significant environmental and socio-economic impacts. Over all, the rigorous study showed the changes in land use land cover and its drivers were common in Lake Ziway Catchment. Therefore, appropriate policies and strategies are required to address LULC change impacts and enhance sustainable utilization and management of the Lake Ziway catchment.

This paper discusses results of a Gulf of Mexico Application Pilot project conducted in 2008 to quantify and assess land use land cover (LULC) change from 1974 to 2008. Led by NASA Stennis Space Center, this project involved multiple Gulf of Mexico Alliance (GOMA) partners, including the Mobile Bay National Estuary Program (NEP), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA's) National Coastal Data Development Center (NCDDC), and the NOAA Coastal Services Center. The Mobile Bay region provides great economic and ecologie benefits to the Nation, including important coastal habitat for a broad diversity of fisheries and wildlife. The Mobile Bay region has experienced considerable LULC change since the latter half of the 20th century. Accompanying this change has been urban expansion and a reduction of rural land uses. Much of this LULC change (largely urbanization) has reportedly occurred since the landfall of Hurricane Frederic in 1979. Regional urbanization threatens the estuary's water quality and aquatic-habitat dependent biota, including commercial fisheries and avian wildlife. Coastal conservation and urban land use planners require additional information on historical LULC change to support coastal habitat restoration and resiliency management efforts. This project quantified and assessed LULC change across the 34-year time frame and at decadal and mid-decadal scales. Nine Landsat images were employed to compute LULC products because of their availability and suitability for the application. The project also used Landsat-based national LULC products, including coastal LULC products from NOAA's Coastal Change & Analysis Program (C-CAP), available at 5-year intervals since 1995. Our study was initiated in part because C-CAP LULC products were not available to assess the region's urbanization prior to 1995 and subsequent to post-Hurricane Katrina in 2006. The study area included the majority of Mobile and Baldwin counties that encompass Mobile Bay. Each date of Landsat data was classified using an end-user defined modified Anderson level 1 classification scheme. LULC classifications were refined using a decision rule approach in conjunction with available C-CAP products. Individual dates of LULC classifications were validated by image interpretation of stratified random locations on raw Landsat color composite imagery in combination with higher resolution remote sensing and in situ reference data. Overall classification accuracies for five separate single-date products ranged from 83% to 89%. The results of the LULC change analysis indicate that during the 34-year study period, urban areas increased from 96,688 to 150,227 acres, representing a 55.37% increase, or 1.63% per annum. Most of the identified urban expansion regarded the conversion of rural forest and agriculture to urban cover types. Final LULC mapping and metadata products were produced for the entire study area as well as for multiple watersheds of concern within the study area. The final project products, including LULC trend information, were incorporated into the Mobile Bay NEP State of the Bay report. Products and metadata were also transferred to NOAA NCDDC to allow free online accessibility and use by GOMA partners and by the public.

Land use land cover (LULC) changes resulting from copper exploration in Kitwe District, Copperbelt Province has adversely impacted the environment. To understand LULC change dynamics associated with mining activities, this study mapped LULC changes using the Google Earth Engine (GEE) from 1990 to 2020. In addition, the Zambian legal framework for mine closure was assessed in terms of adequacy and comprehensiveness. A remote sensing analysis using Landsat TM (1990, 2000, and 2010) and OLI (2020) images was performed and the GEE Random Forest classifier algorithm was employed to detect LULC changes. Then, transition matrices and overall changes were calculated for each LULC class. The LULC classification had an overall accuracy and kappa coefficient of 82.47% and 0.78, respectively. In total, 45.2% of the district area (360.92 km2) experienced LULC changes from 1990 to 2020. The overall change indicates that the areas of built-up area, bare land, and grassland/pasture/agricultural land gained 35.84, 14.67, and 43.53 km2, respectively, while forest lost 95.30 km2, with the major driver being the privatization of mining companies. Several concerns regarding the mine closure process practiced in Zambia have principally been raised to the government. Although the legislation generally conformed to international best practices, a gap involving various pieces of legislation, overlapping requirements, and different interpretations of the laws by different governmental departments makes the system complex and unmanageable. An area of concern is the government’s capability and competence to implement legislation. Ineffective law enforcement, that is, the inadequacy of the legislation, is to blame for LULC changes in mining areas, resulting in mining corporations not paying attention to the changes made, particularly regarding mine closures. This study provides decision-makers and land use planners with baseline knowledge on LULC changes that can be valuable for future mining legislation and how these legislations can be effectively executed to ensure sustainable mine closure.


 
 
 Floods are one of the most common natural disasters worldwide. Apart from rainfall, Land Use Land Cover (LULC) changes too are a main contributory factor for floods. This study attempted to understand the link between floods and LULC changes in Kalu river basin, which is the second largest river basin and an area that experiences recurrent floods in Sri Lanka. We studied peak water levels, number of flood events, changes in land use types and impacts in rapidly urbanizing two districts, Rathnapura (upper basin) and Kalutara (lower basin) during 2001-2020. The satellite images (LANDSAT) were obtained for 2001, 2009, 2015 and 2020 and land use classification was done using ArcGIS and Remote Sensing Tools. Main land use types and their transformations were investigated and ground-truthing was carried out. Accordingly, the main types of land uses identified were Natural Vegetation and forests (NV), Settlements (ST- housing and industrial lands), Cultivated Lands (CL), Water Bodies (WB) and Bare Lands (BL). The results indicated that the most drastic change was found in the natural areas (NV) and they have diminished while the lands with anthropogenic impacts (ST, CL and BL) have increased across years. The NV had occupied the highest land area in 2001 (42.4%) and has reduced by 14.2% by 2020. The ST and CL have increased by 8.6 % and 5.2% respectively. The monthly rainfall of Rathnapura and Kalutara (Source: Department of Meteorology, Sri Lanka) has increased with time, which is a main reason for the increasing peak water levels of these areas (Source: Department of Irrigation, Sri Lanka). However, a significant correlation also exists between the change of the settlement area with the peak river water levels in the lower basin (p=0.03, R2=99%; regression analysis). Rathnapura has experienced 3 major floods (floods above the high water alert level) from 2001-2020, while 16 major floods have occurred in Kalutara. During the major flood in 2017, the number of child deaths in Rathnapura was 14 while in Kalutara it was 24. Accordingly, the LULC changes of the whole basin along with rainfall seem to influence on the severity of floods in Kalutara more, as it is located in the lowest elevation level. When natural lands are transformed to anthropogenic- impacted areas with disturbances to the water cycle, increased impervious surfaces, reduced water storage capacities and loss of natural drainage, the flood risk tends to increase. Proactive approaches including proper land use planning and rainwater storage are urgently needed as the climate change too would trigger more floods. Thus, the flood mitigatory actions, especially, in the lower river basin should be a priority to ensure resilience and sustainability.
 Keywords: Kalu river basin, Land Use Land Cover (LULC) changes, Floods
 
 

Land use land cover (LULC) change determination caused by development projects is always mandatory as land is the major source of local livelihoods and regional economy. Worldwide, very limited studies have been conducted to determine LULC changes caused by run-of-the-river projects, which are generally considered safe due to their design. Present study used Google Earth Engine (GEE) to examine the LULC changes caused by Ghazi Barotha Hydropower Project (GBHP), which is a run-of-the-river project, built in 2002 on Indus River in Pakistan. The project diverts river water from Ghazi barrage, for a 6,600 GWh annual power production, through an open concrete power channel of 100 m width and 9 m depth. Field surveys were carried out to assess respondents’ opinions about LULC changes and their major causes. LULC determination was carried out from 1990–2020 through processing Landsat images in GEE, and Random Forest (RF) machine learning technique was used for supervised classification of the study area. 384 respondents were consulted during the field survey and their responses were collected using semi-structured self-administered proformas. Results showed that after functioning, GBHP caused major LULC changes in project downstream areas from 2002–2010, as there was a significant decrease in area under agriculture by 29.10% and 47%, during summer and winter seasons respectively. The trend was concurrent with a decrease in area under water and was also followed by a marked increase in area under vegetation and baresoil. However, from 2010–2020, agriculture area again increased by 75.61% and 84.53% in summer and winter seasons respectively, as compared to 2002–2010. Respondents during the field survey revealed that agriculture reduction from 2002–2010 was due to water scarcity caused by GBHP; also leading to vegetation and baresoil increase. Recovery of agriculture from 2010–2020 was attributed to groundwater development intervention, better seeds, and farmers’ capacity building.

Spatio-temporal and cumulative effects of land use-land cover and climate change on two ecosystem services in the Colombian Andes

Land Use Land Cover (LULC) changes analysis is one of the most useful methodologies to understand how the land was used in the past years, what types of detections are to be expected in the future, as well as the driving forces and processes behind these changes. In Ethiopia, Africa, the rapid variations of LULC observed in the last decades are mainly due to population pressure, resettlement programs, climate change, and other human- and nature-induced driving forces. Anthropogenic activities are the most significant factors adversely changing the natural status of the landscape and resources, which exerts unfavourable and adverse impacts on the environment and livelihood. The main goal of the present work is to review previous studies, discussing the spatiotemporal LULC changes in Ethiopian basins, to find out common points and gaps that exist in the current literature, to be eventually addressed in the future. A total of 25 articles, published from 2011 to 2020, were selected and reviewed, focusing on LULC classification using ArcGIS and ERDAS imagine software by unsupervised and maximum likelihood supervised classification methods. Key informant interview, focal group discussions, and collection of ground truth information using ground positioning systems for data validation were the major approaches applied in most of the studies. All the analysed research showed that, during the last decades, Ethiopian lands changed from natural to agricultural land use, waterbody, commercial farmland, and built-up/settlement. Some parts of forest land, grazing land, swamp/wetland, shrubland, rangeland, and bare/ rock out cropland cover class changed to other LULC class types, mainly as a consequence of the increasing anthropogenic pressure. In summary, these articles confirmed that LULC changes are a direct result of both natural and human influences, with anthropogenic pressure due to globalisation as the main driver. However, most of the studies provided details of LULC for the past decades within a specific spatial location, while they did not address the challenge of forecasting future LULC changes at the watershed scale, therefore reducing the opportunity to develop adequate basin-wide management strategies for the next years.

Evaluating land cover changes in Eastern and Southern Africa from 2000 to 2010 using validated Landsat and MODIS data

In rapidly growing areas, land use land cover (LULC) change is one of the most pre-eminent features of environmental changes produced by human-induced activities. LULC changes are critical issues and challenges for environmentally friendly and sustainable development. Understanding land-use and land-cover (LULC) changing patterns is critical for sustainable environmental management, particularly effective water management. This study was focused on the assessment of LULC and sinuosity of the Seti River sub-Basin over 28 years. Satellite imagery of Landsat series (MS, TM, and OLI) were classified using maximum likelihood classifier to create LULC maps for 1991, 2004 and 2019. The LULC change was assessed using change detection analysis and verified the result by confuse matrix. The results showed that forest cover is regaining its original status with the increasing rate of 1.31%. In the meantime, built-up areas are expanding with the rate of 2.62% while agricultural land has decreased with the rate of -1.89% per year and are more converted to built-up area. Trendofsinuosityindexfoundincreasing and varying in different sections of the river path indicated the complex response of changing characteristics of river flow, river mining and geomorphology of landscape. Based on research findings and descriptions from earlier works, river morphology is affected by both natural (topography, climate, precipitation), and anthropogenic (rapid urbanization, foreign labor migration, abandonment of cultivable land, community forest programs, development activities) factors.

Understanding trends of land use land cover (LULC) changes is important for biodiversity monitoring and conservation planning, and identifying the areas affected by change and designing sustainable solutions to reduce the changes. The study aims to evaluate and quantify the historical changes in land use and land cover in Mukumbura (Ward 2), Mt Darwin, Zimbabwe, from 2002 to 2022. The objective of the study was to analyse the LULC changes in Ward 2 (Mukumbura), Mt Darwin, Northern Zimbabwe, for a period of 20 years using geospatial techniques. Landsat satellite images were processed using Google Earth Engine (GEE) and the supervised classification with maximum likelihood algorithm was employed to generate LULC maps between 2002 and 2022 with a five (5) year interval, investigating the following variables, forest cover, barren land, water cover and the fields. Findings revealed a substantial reduction in forest cover by 38.8%, water bodies (wetlands, ponds, and rivers) declined by 55.6%, whilst fields (crop/agricultural fields) increased by 93.3% and the barren land cover increased by 26.3% from 2002 to 2022. These findings point to substantial changes in LULC over the observed years. LULC changes have resulted in habitat fragmentation, reduced biodiversity, and the disruption of ecosystem functions. The study concludes that if these deforestation trends, cultivation, and settlement land expansion continue, the ward will have limited indigenous fruit trees. Therefore, the causes for LULC changes must be controlled, sustainable forest resources use practiced, hence the need to domesticate the indigenous fruit trees in arborloo toilets.

Flooding is one of the most frequent and destructive environmental hazards globally, and Indonesia is among the most affected countries. Understanding land use land cover (LULC) changes and flood distribution is essential for effective mitigation strategies. However, conventional methods using multiple processing environments are time-consuming, whereas integrating multi-sensor data within a single platform such as Google Earth Engine (GEE) improves efficiency and accuracy. This study aims to analyzes flood distribution and LULC changes in the Konaweha watershed from 2015 to 2024 using multi-temporal Sentinel-1 SAR and Landsat-8 optical imagery. Flooded areas were mapped using the Otsu thresholding combined with change detection, while LULC changes were identified using the Random Forest algorithm. The result reveal that flood inundation expanded from 6,709.24 ha in 2015 to 16,295.35 ha in 2020, before declining to 9,243.28 ha in 2024. Major LULC transitions included reductions in wetlands (12.82 %), primary forest (1.94 %), and agriculture (28.82 %), alongside increase in built-up areas (80.48 %), secondary forest (8.13 %), and water bodies (41.76 %). This finding indicate a strong correlation between flood occurrence and LULC changes, emphasizing the influence of environmental degradation on flood dynamics. The study contributes to global discourse on flood risk assessment by demonstrating the effectiveness of integrating multi-sensor remote sensing data for near real-time flood monitoring and sustainable land management planning.