Spatiotemporal changes in land cover land use in protected areas of Serra da Mantiqueira, Southeastern Brazil

Abstract

An assessment of the dynamics of land cover and use in and around a Protected Area (PA) located in the Área de Preservação Ambiental da Serra da Mantiqueira (APASM; Mantiqueira Mountain Range Environmental Protection Area) and Parque Nacional do Itatiaia (PNI; Itatiaia National Park) has been developed. This PA is part of the Brazilian Mata Atlântica (MA; Atlantic Forest) biome, which is of great importance in providing water resources and in biodiversity maintenance since it is one of the largest and most populated urban centers in Brazil. In two contiguous drainage basins, with an area of 24,757.65 hectares (ha), proposals have been sought that lead to monitoring of forests pressured by anthropic actions that have as an inductor vehicle the roads built around the PA. Results obtained by Remote Sensing (RS) data show that pasture areas have grown 43% between 1985 and 2005 and forest areas have declined 20% in the same period. However, between 2005 and 2017, there was a 22% decline in pasture area and rehabilitation in forest areas by 26%. Urban spots have steadily grown by nearly 120% between 1985 and 2017. In a Geographic Information System (GIS) environment and using multiple-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) with a weighted sum to environmental attributes of roads and urban spots, it has also been verified that 85% of the study area is under high or very high pressure, which can jeopardize the maintenance of biodiversity and water resources in the region due to population increase induced by secondary roads and their paving, which moves towards the PNI limits.