<div><p>In the eastern coastal cities of China, the need for supervision of illegal land use is urgent requiring new ways to promptly identify and put a stop to the practice. In this paper, we present a practical example through the generation of thematic maps for illegal land use risk assessment in Shenzhen city with the assistance of GIS. Thematic maps are useful in relation to the following points. First, they could be a template for generating illegal land use risk assessment maps. Second, illegal land use risk assessment maps indicate the different risk levels of each community, which allows for more effective illegal land use supervision to protect the cultivated and ecological land. Third, with the assistance of GIS, the process of spatial analysis and mapping becomes more efficient as a tool in this supervision.</p></div
