Spatiotemporal Analysis of Vegetation Cover in Kurdistan Region-Iraq using MODIS Image Data

Abstract

The rapidly and wide use of remote sensing and accurately obtain information on the spatiotemporal distribution of large-scale vegetation is of great significance for improving and managing the Environment. To assess and analyze the spatiotemporal variation of vegetation status in Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRGI), we used time series NDVI-based vegetation that are extracted from MOD13Q1 MODIS product over 20 years (2000 - 2019). The results showed that vegetation was mainly distributed in the north-east to south-east of the KRGI, while west region has less distributed and almost no vegetation. This is clearly remarkable in the south-west part of the region (Garmian administration). While, the most dominated vegetation province was Duhok province in KRGI during study period. There is a noticeable temporal variation in vegetation over a period of 20-year in the KRGI. The lower vegetated cover area is observed in the years 2000, 2008, and 2009. The increase/decrease of vegetated cover area is not only effected by climate conditions. The anthropogenic resource is also one of the main resources that has a major influence on the increase/decrease of vegetation.