ANALYSIS OF LAND USE AND LAND COVER CHANGES OF A RURAL SUB-WATERSHED USING RS AND GIS IN TAMILNADU, INDIA

Abstract

Knowledge of the distribution of land use and land cover (LULC) is important for land planning and land management activities. Repetitive nature of IRS IC LISS III and PAN merged imagery data has been utilized for measuring qualitative and quantitative spatial information of LULC changes at different levels for various aspects. In handy, the available three years LULC maps in 1995, 2003 and 2012 have been taken into account to know the past and present patterns of LULC in the upper Manimuktha sub-watershed (4CIA2e) of Tamilnadu. The digitization of these maps, relationship between changes and its trend is analysed using ArcGIS software and compared. The study area is dominated by agricultural land, forest land followed by water bodies, waste land and settlement. The results are presented spatially as well as graphically by GIS maps and bar-chart. From this study, it is inferred that there are significant positive (10.19%) changes in agricultural land and negative (3.09%) changes in forest cover in the study area because of the increasing human population need as well as to generate more income. It is necessary to conserve forest of the study area for sustainable development.