Abstract
Agricultural land use planning should always be guided by a reliable tool to ensure effective decision making in the allocation of land use and activities. The primary aim of this study is to develop a user friendly system on a spatial basis for agricultural land suitability evaluation of four groups of agriculture commodities, including food crops, horticultural crops, perennial (plantation) crops, grazing, and tambak (fish ponds) to guide land use planning. The procedure used is as follows: (i) conducting soil survey based on generated land mapping units; (ii) developing soil database in GIS; and (iii) designing a user friendly system. The data bases of the study were derived from satellite imagery, digital topographic map, soil characteristics at reconnaissance scale, as well as climate data. Land suitability evaluation in this study uses the FAO method. The study produces a spatial based decision support tool called SUFIG-Wilkom that can give decision makers sets of information interactively for land use allocation purposes.This user friendly system is also amenable to various operations in a vector GIS, so that the system may accommodate possible additional assessment of other land use types.
Highlights
Land use planning in agricultural development is necessary to guide decision makers in attempting to select appropriate types of land use, determining optimal spatial locations of the planned agricultural activity, identifying and formulating opportunities for land use change, and anticipating the consequences of changing land use policies
The primary aim of this study is to develop a user friendly system for assessing land suitability for agricultural development using Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
This study has produced a user friendly system that can be used for optimal decision making in land use allocation, on the basis of land suitability assessment
Summary
Land use planning in agricultural development is necessary to guide decision makers in attempting to select appropriate types of land use, determining optimal spatial locations of the planned agricultural activity, identifying and formulating opportunities for land use change, and anticipating the consequences of changing land use policies. As a core component of land use planning, land suitability assessment is fundamental at all stages of planning and implementation, and at any stage of development of an area (Nurmiaty & Baja, 2014) to determine the suitability and availability of land for alternative uses. In Indonesia, agricultural development has gradually shifted to using marginal land as agricultural land is undergoing a massive transformation. This is often accompanied by changing objectives of land use, owing to increasing demands for specific commodities in the rural environment. Such a practice threatens long-term ecologically sustainable production which is recognized as a key element of food security, in resource-poor areas. Land use change from agriculture to non-agriculture as such becomes one of common phenomena in urban and rural areas that threaten the country’s food security program
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