Abstract
The Murchison Bay catchment in the northern shoreline of Lake Victoria basin is a high valued ecosystem because of the numerous human-related activities it supports in Uganda. The catchment has undergone tremendous human-induced land use/cover changes, which have not been quantified. This study aimed at quantifying the land use/cover changes as well as the rate at which these changes occurred over the last three decades in the catchment. This was achieved using remote sensing techniques and Geographic Information System (GIS) to analyse and contextualize the changes. To that effect, images of Landsat satellites MSS, TM, ETM+ and OLI were interpreted using supervised image classification technique to determine the land use/land cover changes from 1984 to 2015. The obtained results indicated that the catchment has undergone huge land use and land cover transformations over the last three decades attributable to rapid population growth and urbanization. The prevailing changes in footprint between 1984 and 2015 were expansions of built–up land (20.58% to 49.59%) and open water bodies (not detected in 1984 to 1.74%), and decreases in the following sectors: agricultural lands (from 43.88% to 26.10%), forestland (from 23.78% to 17.49%), and wetlands (from 11.76% to 5.08%). The changes pose a threat to the environment and water quality of the Murchison Bay and consequently increases National Water and Sewerage Corporation water treatment costs. Therefore, there is the need to take critical and practical measures to regulate and police land use, water use rights and conserve the environment especially wetlands.
Highlights
Land is one of the most vital natural resources that support people’s livelihoods and development, its use is a fundamental factor of any human activity (Diyer et al, 2013; NEMA, 2009)
Land use is any form of human activity on the land with the intention to benefit from the land resources
The Murchison Bay is an extension of Lake Victoria situated in the south-east of Kampala city which lies between latitudes 00o 10’ 00” N – 00o 30’ 00” N and longitudes 32o 35’ 00” E – 32o 50’ 00”E with average elevation of 1224 m above sea level
Summary
Land is one of the most vital natural resources that support people’s livelihoods and development, its use is a fundamental factor of any human activity (Diyer et al, 2013; NEMA, 2009). Land use is any form of human activity on the land with the intention to benefit from the land resources. According to Olofsson et al (2013), the impact of land use and land cover change may be felt across a wide spectrum of environmental systems including the atmosphere, hydrology, geomorphology and ecology. About 83% of the global terrestrial land surface has been affected by the activities of humans and 60% of the ecosystem degraded over the past half century. The modification of the terrestrial surface of the earth is generally referred as land use and land cover change (Ellis, 2013)
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