Abstract
Bangladesh has undergone dramatic land use and land cover changes (LULCC) in recent years, but no quantitative analysis of LULCC drivers at the national scale exists so far. Here, we quantified the drivers of major LULCC in combination with biophysical and socioeconomic observations at the sub-district level. We used Landsat satellite data to interpret LULCC from 2000 to 2010 and employed a Global Surface Water Dataset to account for the influences of water seasonality. The results suggest that major LULCC in Bangladesh occur between agricultural land and waterbodies and between forest and shrubland. Exclusion of seasonal waterbodies can improve the accuracy of our LULCC results and driver analysis. Although the gross gain and loss of agricultural land are large on the local scale, the net change (gross gain minus gross loss) at a country scale is almost negligible. Climate dynamics and extreme events and changes in urban and rural households were driving the changes from forest to shrubland in the southeast region. The conversion from agricultural land to standing waterbodies in the southwest region was mainly driven by urban household dynamics, population growth, distance to cities and major roads, and precipitation dynamics. This study, which is the first effort accounting for water seasonality and quantifying biophysical and socioeconomic drivers of LULCC at the national scale, provides a perspective on overall LULCC and underlying drivers over a decadal time scale and national spatial scale and can serve as a scientific basis for developing land policies in Bangladesh.
Highlights
Land use and land cover changes (LULCC) is the key topic in global change studies since they can alter regional and global climate through changing biophysical, biogeochemical, and biogeographical characteristics of the Earth system (Jain et al 2013; Robinson et al 2013; Xu et al 2016)
The objective of our study is to improve our understanding of the dynamics and drivers of LULCC at the national scale, which is of great importance for managing future challenges in LULCC
This study successfully reveals the dominant biophysical and socioeconomic drivers of major LULCC activities in Bangladesh
Summary
Land use and land cover changes (LULCC) is the key topic in global change studies since they can alter regional and global climate through changing biophysical, biogeochemical, and biogeographical characteristics of the Earth system (Jain et al 2013; Robinson et al 2013; Xu et al 2016). Reg Environ Change (2020) 20: 54 better understand the LULCC processes and mechanisms to develop models and land policies for a country. LULCC is driven by anthropogenic activities, such as socioeconomic development. It is influenced by biophysical factors, such as climate, terrain, and soil quality (Dewan et al 2012). About 60% of land changes are associated with direct human activities and the rest with indirect drivers, such as climate change during the period 1982–2016 (Song et al 2018). The quantitative analyses on the LULCC drivers at the national scale are still limited, especially in developing countries, which have experienced greater LULCC in recent years (Dewan and Yamaguchi 2009; Sloan and Sayer 2015)
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