Investigation the driving forces of land-use change in northeastern Iran: Causes and effects

Abstract

Land-use change is the most important causes of disturbances in the natural environment. This process increases the severity of natural disasters such as floods, dust storms, etc. Moreover, it leads to major unnatural events such as water, soil and air pollution and land subsidence. The objective of this study was to determine land-use change trends, causes, and driving forces of changes in Taybad-Bakharz region, Iran, for two times period (1977–2001, 2001–2016). According to the results, the studied areas were classified into five land-use classes including; residential area, cropland, salty land, rangeland, and barren land. The barren lands and rangeland had the highest percentage of area in 1977, which covered 85.5% of the area in equal proportion. Irrigated and rainfed agriculture increased during both periods. The percentage of agricultural areas reached from 7.8% in 1977 to 9.7% in 2001, and 14.3% in 2016. Due to continuous growth in population from 50,000 in 1977 to 160,000 in 2016, the residential area's growth had been dynamic during two periods and increased from .14% to .4%. It was clearl that a major land-use change had occurred in Taybad-Bakharz region. During 40 years, the capable lands converted to the agriculture lands. Three factors that have been led to increasing agriculture areas are technology and agricultural machinery entry, deep well drilling industry, and wet years that encouraged people to cultivated lands.