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Future Prediction of Land Covers in Devikulam Taluk, Kerala

Abstract

Land Cover of the Earth is undergoing significant transformation due to natural and human induced interventions. Information about land use change is very essential for planning, monitoring and management of natural resources. Prediction of natural and social causes of land cover change through spatially explicit models is made possible by GIS and other computer based techniques which can define and test relationships between environment and social variables using a combination of existing data, observations on the ground and the data from remote sensing. This study is proposed with an objective to inventory various land cover classes in Devikulam Taluk, Kerala. With the help of temporal data sets, the dynamics of the different land use classes in the study area has also been attempted. An attempt is made to correlate each land cover class for the Land Transformation Model (LTM) developed based upon Markov and Cellular Automata. Using the developed LTM, generation of the future scenario of land cover of the study area has been attempted. This information is expected to be useful for the assessment of land cover change and plan for better land management strategies after a review of the future trends in the land cover patterns. This study shows the extent of forest area which is degraded and converted to other land cover classes

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