Identification of land cover change and spatial distribution based on topographic variations in Java Island

Abstract

Population growth and rapid development can increase the need for land, especially for settlements which impacts the reduced land availability on Java Island. This impact is unavoidable Land Cover Change (LCC). The LCC that occurs needs special attention as it can significantly impact climate change, contributing to 33% of global carbon emissions. One of the supporting factors of LCC is topographic variation. No studies on priority areas for settlement management consider the LCC results based on topographic variations. Thus, this study aims to model the priority areas for handling LCC residential areas based on topographic variations by considering the 2000–2018 Land Cover data on the island of Java, Indonesia, and to compare the residential priority area results with the 2030 land cover prediction model using the Markov Chain-Cellular Automata method. Topographic variations that cause LCC can be determined by looking at the threshold in each land cover change class with its elevation class, using a mathematical approach to obtain an average value in each land cover change. The results showed that areas with low topography change more rapidly than those with high topography. The modeling results will also be validated with Land Cover data in 2020 by looking at changes from 2018 on topographic variations and whether they are following the predetermined threshold. The validation results show an overall accuracy value of 0.796. This study hopes it can be considered for policy making in development planning, especially in Java, Indonesia.