Effects of Land Use and Land Cover Change on Tse Gavar Forest Reserve, Vandeikya Local Government Area, Benue State, Nigeria

Emmanuel Tertsea Ikyaagba,Joseph Asen Jande,Mercy Kpadoo Abiem

doi:10.37284/eajfa.2.1.127

Emmanuel Tertsea Ikyaagba, Joseph Asen Jande + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.37284/eajfa.2.1.127

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Abstract

Forests are considered to be the very basis for human existence as they touch virtually every aspect of human endeavour. Despite the numerous benefits of forests, the world is experiencing unprecedented degradation of forest and its resources; this is mainly attributed to land use and land cover (LULC) change. Therefore, monitoring of these changes has become a necessity. Hence, the use of remotely sensed data in conjunction with GIS for land use and land cover analysis of Tse Gavar community forest in Vandeikya Local Government Area would definitely enhance the available data for sustainable management and promotion of community forest in the State. This study made use of mostly secondary data from pre-existing satellites imageries. The Landsat TM for 1986, Landsat ETM+ for 2001 and 2012 as well as OLI for 2018 images were sourced from the Earthexplorer platform from United States Geological Surveys (USGS), Global Land Cover Facility (GLCF) and GloVis. Images were subjected to various image processing techniques and supervised classification was carried out on the various images. The classification resulted in classes of farmland, other vegetation, forest area and bare land. The percentage of LULC in Tse Gavar Forest Reserve indicated that farmland increased from 5.78% in 1986 to 18.25% in 2018. Shrubland also increased from 3.06% in 1986 to 21.08% in 2018. Forested area decreased from 84.17% in 1986 to 59.38% in 2018. The magnitude of land use/land cover change within the 32 years period showed that 9.36 Ha of the forest area was lost to other forms of land use, the bare land area lost within the period was 0.09 Ha to other land uses. Farmland area increased by 4.32 Ha within the period, shrubland increased by 5078.88 km2. It was established that just like other protected areas, land use and land cover changes are going on in the Tse Gavar community forest reserve. Enrichment planting of the reserve was recommended.

Highlights

Throughout the existence of humanity on earth, forests and trees have been of immense benefit to mankind through the provision of food, income, shelter, fibre, energy, medicine, building materials, fodder, and inspiration (Powell et al, 2013; FAO, 2018; Gabay and Rekola, 2019)
This was in agreement with Carr (2004) who opined that rapid population growth has resulted in many environmental challenges that have shot up deforestation and loss of vegetation in urban fringes. This is because as the population of an area goes up, more land will be needed for food production through farming, more land will be needed to build houses and other construction, little will be left as forest area or fallow land. The implication of this is that Tse Gavar community forest will in no distant future be deforested and converted to different land use land cover classes which will lead to a decline in biodiversity, increased soil erosion and land degradation and habitat destruction
The results of the analysis established that there was a tremendous change in the land cover and land use in Tse Gavar community forest in the past 32 years period from 1986 to 2018

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Throughout the existence of humanity on earth, forests and trees have been of immense benefit to mankind through the provision of food, income, shelter, fibre, energy, medicine, building materials, fodder, and inspiration (Powell et al, 2013; FAO, 2018; Gabay and Rekola, 2019). This is roughly 50 football fields in a minute (Laurance, 2010) This disappearance is restricted to non-formally protected forest as both protected areas (PAs) and community forests are experiencing LULC changes (Defries et al, 2007; Scholte, 2011; Faye et al, 2016). The changes that we are witnessing today generate a lot of environmental problems for human populations Some of these include climate change, biodiversity loss as well as water, air and soil. It is imperative for researchers and policymakers around the world to monitor and mediate the negative consequences of LULC change, at the same time sustaining the production of essential resources (Ellis and Pontius, 2010).

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CONCLUSION