Abstract
Landscape dynamics driven by land use land cover (LULC) changes due to anthropogenic activities altering the functional ability of an ecosystem has influenced the ecology, biodiversity, hydrology and people’s sustainable livelihood. Forest landscape dynamics have been quantified using spatial data acquired through space borne sensors along with collateral data. Vegetation cover assessment of Central Western Ghats shows the decline of vegetation from 92.87% (1973) to 80.42% (2016). Land use analyses reveal the trend of deforestation, evident from the reduction of evergreen-semi evergreen forest cover from 67.73% (1973) to 29.5% (2016). The spatial patterns of diverse landscape have been assessed through spatial metrics and categorical principal component analysis, reveal a transition of intact forested landscape (1973) to fragmented landscape. The analysis has provided insights to formulate appropriate policies to mitigate forest changes in the region to safeguard water and food security apart from livelihood of the local people for sustainable development.
Highlights
Landscape consists of heterogeneous biophysical elements with dynamic interactions [1] that ensures the sustainability of natural resources
Transition of evergreen-semi evergreen forests to moist deciduous forests, and some have been converted into plantations constitute 10.78% and 7.67% respectively
Analysis of land use land cover (LULC) dynamics using temporal Remote sensing (RS) data aided in understanding causes of changes, focussing on conservation and restoration of ecosystems
Summary
Landscape consists of heterogeneous biophysical elements with dynamic interactions [1] that ensures the sustainability of natural resources. The complex interactions among ecological, economic, social and cultural entities, which depend on the structure of the landscape play a decisive role in the respective ecosystem’s functions (cycling of water and nutrients, bio-geo-chemical cycles, etc.). This necessitates understanding of landscape structure (size, shape, and configuration) and constituent’s spatial patterns (linear, regular and aggregated) through land use land cover [LULC] analysis. Temporal LULC information is vital for elucidating landscape dynamics, essential for regional planning and sustainable management of natural resources [7,13]
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