Assessing the impacts of urbanization on agricultural land using Remote Sensing and GIS techniques: The case of Adet town, Ethiopia
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Date
2023-06-16
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Urbanization was one of the main problems that threaten the limited highly fertile and very
productive agricultural land in the periphery of Adet town for residential construction and its
related infrastructure. The general objective was to assess the impacts of urbanization on
agricultural land using remote sensing and GIS techniques and within it classified the land use
land cover dynamics during the time periods of 2000, 2010 and 2020, mapped horizontal
expansion of urban boundary and analyzed its effect on the surrounding agricultural land and
identified the major trigger factors for horizontal expansion. By using Landsat satellite images
generated change detection analysis and mapped horizontal expansions in this particular study.
Additionally conducted interviews and identified the trigger socio-economic contributing
factors of horizontal expansion. The supervised classification algorithm and Anderson (1976)
land use/ land cover classification scheme ware adopted and identified: agricultural land, built
up area, vegetation and bare land. The result revealed that agricultural land coverage 66% in
2000, 64% in 2010 and 51% in 2020. The built up area coverage 29% in 2000, 27% in 2010
and 36% in 2020. The vegetation coverage increased 2% from 2000 to 2010, 5% from 2010 to
2020 and 8% from 2000 to 2020 and the bare land coverage 2% in 2000, 4% in 2010 and 5%
in 2020. The factors that were responsible for horizontal expansion was increasing the demand
for residential house of dwellers, growth and transformation plan (GTP), asphalt and gravel
road construction, rural-urban migration, demographic dynamics, reclassification of the former
rural settlement into new urban settlement, supporting housing policy and informal settlements.
Generally urbanization was loss of agricultural land continuously. So, to prevent the loss of
highly fertile and very productive agricultural land effective land use and land management
strategies should be strongly encouraged. Furthermore, a sound policy at the local level is
urgently needed. This study can be contributed to the government especially Adet town
municipality and surroundings of Adet town, yilmana densa wereda, to ensure the
developmental plans in certain areas other than highly fertile and very productive agriculture
land and strengthen the zoning regulation and enact policies to reduce agriculture land losses
and reclassification of the peripheral rural kebeles being as part of an administrative body to
the town municipality. The finding of this study will also be significant in providing realistic
information and initial input for urban planning experts, stakeholders, governmental and nongovernmental
organizations and other researchers.