Land Use and Land Cover Change Within and Around the Greater Serengeti Ecosystem, Tanzania
Hamza Khalid Kija,
Joseph Ochieng Ogutu,
Lazaro Johana Mangewa,
John Bukombe,
Francesca Verones,
Bente Jessen Graae,
Jafari Ramadhani Kideghesho,
Mohammed Yahya Said,
Emmanuel Fred Nzunda
Issue:
Volume 8, Issue 1, June 2020
Pages:
1-19
Received:
3 March 2020
Accepted:
20 March 2020
Published:
29 April 2020
Abstract: Land use and land cover (LULC) changes can pose profound impacts on wildlife habitats, abundance and distribution and on human-dominated landscapes. We investigated LULC changes in the Greater Serengeti ecosystem, Tanzania, for a period of 41 years from 1975 to 2015. Specifically, we mapped LULC types for 1975, 1995 and 2015 and assessed the corresponding changes during 1975-1995, 1995-2015 and 1975-2015. We used the random forest classification algorithm to classify Multispectral Scanner (MSS), Thematic Mapper (TM), Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (+ETM) and Operational Land Imager (OLI) into eight main classes. We obtained accuracies of 88.4%, 90.6% and 93.4% with Kappa Indices of Agreement (KIA) of 0.86, 0.87 and 0.91 for 1975, 1995 and 2015, respectively. Grassland, shrubland and woodland were the major LULC types throughout 1975-2015 with percentage coverages of 50.6%, 23.7% and 20.9% for 1975; 54.2%, 23.5% and 15.9% for 1995; and 57.0%, 23.8% and 8.9% for 2015, respectively. Overall, woodland cover (-11.1%) was converted to most of the other cover types during 1975-2015. The loss of woodland cover is due to increasing human population size, agriculture, settlements and policy changes fires and elephant browsing. Effective conservation policies and regulation of socio-economic activities in the ecosystem and its buffer area are essential to ameliorate declining vegetation cover, especially along the protected areas boundaries.
Abstract: Land use and land cover (LULC) changes can pose profound impacts on wildlife habitats, abundance and distribution and on human-dominated landscapes. We investigated LULC changes in the Greater Serengeti ecosystem, Tanzania, for a period of 41 years from 1975 to 2015. Specifically, we mapped LULC types for 1975, 1995 and 2015 and assessed the corres...
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Trends in Urban Morphological Data Capture: A Review of Theoretical Perspectives on Utility of Geospatial Technology
Issue:
Volume 8, Issue 1, June 2020
Pages:
20-34
Received:
1 August 2019
Accepted:
27 September 2019
Published:
19 May 2020
Abstract: Increasing urbanisation and sub-optimal locations of urban amenities and utilities has resulted in many cities facing environmental, land use and socio-economic challenges. This can be mitigated by the implementation of cost-effective urban development plans and policies together with an in-depth understanding of the interactions existing between urban natural and human systems, an undertaking reliably aided by geospatial technologies notably Remote Sensing, Geographical Information Systems, Global Positioning System and Photogrammetry. Over the year, this has enabled geospatial technology to gain primacy in the urban study areas such as the modelling of urban morphology, development of urban plans and in the study of other urbanization phenomena such as heat balance, air quality and transportation management among others. However, the accuracy, validity and reliability of the by-products of such operations are dependent on the quality of the datasets used. This paper is therefore anchored on an understanding of urban morphology, factors determining its changes over time and demonstrated achievements of the utility of geospatial technology in the study of the same. The paper concludes with policy implications for the applications of the geospatial technology in urban studies.
Abstract: Increasing urbanisation and sub-optimal locations of urban amenities and utilities has resulted in many cities facing environmental, land use and socio-economic challenges. This can be mitigated by the implementation of cost-effective urban development plans and policies together with an in-depth understanding of the interactions existing between u...
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