Shrinking greenery: Land use and land cover changes in Kurram Agency, Kohi Safid Mountains of north-western Pakistan

doi:10.1007/s11629-017-4451-7

CORC > 成都山地灾害与环境研究所 > 中国科学院水利部成都山地灾害与环境研究所 > Journal of Mountain Science > Journal of Mountain Science-2018 > Vol15 No.2

	Shrinking greenery: Land use and land cover changes in Kurram Agency, Kohi Safid Mountains of north-western Pakistan
	Kamal HUSSAIN; Fazlul HAQ; Fazlur RAHMAN
刊名	Journal of Mountain Science
	2018-02
卷号	15 期号:2 页码:296-306
关键词	Pakistan Tribal Areas Deforestation Land Use Land Cover Change Resource Management Global Changes
ISSN号	1672-6316
DOI	10.1007/s11629-017-4451-7
通讯作者	Kamal HUSSAIN
英文摘要	Deforestation and other Land Use and Land Cover (LULC)changes, driven by variety of physical and anthropogenic factors, have altered the mountainous environment. Mountains around the world including northern and north western belts of Pakistan are highly sensitive to deforestation and otherLULCchanges, which have profound impacts on various sectors of bio-physical and socio-economic systems. Assessment of LULCchanges has high significance for protection, conservation and monitoring mountainous environment. The present study is an attempt to assess the landscape changes with particular reference to forest cover depletion in Kurram Agency located in the north western mountain belt of Pakistan. For detailed comparative analysis the study area has been divided into three sections, which coincide with the present administrative divisions of the Agency,i.e.,Upper, Lower and Central Kurram. Temporal span of this study covers four decades. In this study,land use map of 1970 and land sat satellite imageries of 1987, 2000 and 2014 were used as spatial data sets. The images were processed and classified into six LULC classes through geospatial packages and change detection maps were prepared for each division and time period. Findings of the study reveal two trends in the four major LULC categories. Forest and rangeland have shrunk, on average, by 15% and 7.5% respectively while, bare soil and rocks outcrops have expanded by 89% and agriculture land by 7.2% in Kurram agency. The water bodies and snow cover have minor fluctuation in its land area. Major causes of shrinking greeneryis attributed to high influx of Afghan refugees and high energy demand of growing population. However, with outflow of the refugees from Kurram agency the general trend in forest cover has reverted and deforestation rate has slowed down.
语种	英语
内容类型	期刊论文
源URL	[http://ir.imde.ac.cn/handle/131551/20846]
专题	Journal of Mountain Science _Journal of Mountain Science-2018_Vol15 No.2
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Kamal HUSSAIN,Fazlul HAQ,Fazlur RAHMAN. Shrinking greenery: Land use and land cover changes in Kurram Agency, Kohi Safid Mountains of north-western Pakistan[J]. Journal of Mountain Science,2018,15(2):296-306.
APA	Kamal HUSSAIN,Fazlul HAQ,&Fazlur RAHMAN.(2018).Shrinking greenery: Land use and land cover changes in Kurram Agency, Kohi Safid Mountains of north-western Pakistan.Journal of Mountain Science,15(2),296-306.
MLA	Kamal HUSSAIN,et al."Shrinking greenery: Land use and land cover changes in Kurram Agency, Kohi Safid Mountains of north-western Pakistan".Journal of Mountain Science 15.2(2018):296-306.