Dynamics and drivers of land use land cover changes in Bangladesh

Bangladesh;Land use land cover change;Agriculture;Shrimp farming;Forest;Socioeconomic factors;Dynamics;Drivers

Shrestha, Suravi ; Jain ; Atul K.

关键词: Bangladesh;    Land use land cover change;    Agriculture;    Shrimp farming;    Forest;    Socioeconomic factors;    Dynamics;    Drivers;   

Others  :  https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle/2142/97797/SHRESTHA-THESIS-2017.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

美国|英语

来源: The Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship

【 摘 要 】

Land is scarce in Bangladesh: Bangladesh occupies ~0.03 % of world’s land area, but supports over ~2% of human population. This high population to land ratio, combined with socioeconomic development has placed tremendous pressure on Bangladesh’s land resources for food, feed, and fuel. This study assesses the dynamics of land use land cover changes and its subsequent drivers at national and sub-national scales. We show contemporary spatial estimates of land change in Bangladesh using national-level analysis of Landsat imageries for 2000 and 2010. This analysis uses our newly compiled extensive socioeconomic database which covers ~480 sub-districts along with biophysical data. We also synthesized information from over 80 survey-based case studies on land use drivers in Bangladesh to complement our macro-scale analysis. We present a detailed analysis of contemporary land change both in terms of national extent and the use of detailed spatial information on land change, socioeconomic factors, and synthesis of case studies. Our results showed eight broad land cover types, of which majority is covered by agriculture (~70%), waterbody (rivers and shrimp ponds) (~10%) and forests (~8%). We found that agriculture, forestand mangrove areas showed a decreasing trend while bare soil, shrub land, waterbody and settlement showed an increasing trend. We identified three major land conversion types: agriculture to shrimp ponds, forest to shrub land and shrimp ponds to bare soil, and their hotspot regions at a sub-district level. Based on our analysis, we find both biophysical and socioeconomic variables contributing to the land conversions. We find that conversion of agriculture to shrimp ponds is driven by increasing rate of population, urban household size and rural household number, access to highways and variation in temperature. Drivers related to forest to shrubland conversion include increasing rate of population, access to rivers, highways and cities, and increased rate of precipitation. Lastly, shrimp ponds to bare soil conversion is driven by access to highway, cities and rivers, elevation and increasing rate of precipitation.