GEO-SPATIAL ANALYSIS: THE IMPACTS OF LAND POLICY ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHOLISTAN DESERT REGION, PAKISTAN

Abstract

The Cholistan desert region has the potential of agro-pastoral husbandry development with limited natural resources. The Government guided this developmental process through land allotment policy which has different implementation modality each time. The land policy has diverse impacts on the arid and semi-arid regions of the Cholistan desert. The impacts of policy on the socioeconomic conditions of the regions are associated with geo-spatial techniques. The sample settlement is geo-coded, and their responses are combined into two regions i.e. Lesser and Greater Cholistan regions. The combined responses are associated through phi coefficient and Cramér's V. The impacts of land policy in the Lesser Cholistan region are encouraging the developmental process while in Greater Cholistan, it discourages the development with poor socioeconomic conditions. The present study provide opportunity for understanding, mode of implementation and modification in land policy to achieve sustainable development.