Dynamics and drivers of land use land cover changes in Bangladesh

Land is scarce in Bangladesh: Bangladesh occupies ~0.03 % of world’s land area, but supports over ~2% of human population. This high population to land ratio, combined with socioeconomic development has placed tremendous pressure on Bangladesh’s land resources for food, feed, and fuel. This study assesses the dynamics of land use land cover changes and its subsequent drivers at national and sub-national scales. We show contemporary spatial estimates of land change in Bangladesh using national-level analysis of Landsat imageries for 2000 and 2010. This analysis uses our newly compiled extensive socioeconomic database which covers ~480 sub-districts along with biophysical data. We also synthesized information from over 80 survey-based case studies on land use drivers in Bangladesh to complement our macro-scale analysis. We present a detailed analysis of contemporary land change both in terms of national extent and the use of detailed spatial information on land change, socioeconomic factors, and synthesis of case studies. Our results showed eight broad land cover types, of which majority is covered by agriculture (~70%), waterbody (rivers and shrimp ponds) (~10%) and forests (~8%). We found that agriculture, forest and mangrove areas showed a decreasing trend while bare soil, shrub land, waterbody and settlement showed an increasing trend. We identified three major land conversion types: agriculture to shrimp ponds, forest to shrub land and shrimp ponds to bare soil, and their hotspot regions at a sub-district level. Based on our analysis, we find both biophysical and socioeconomic variables contributing to the land conversions. We find that conversion of agriculture to shrimp ponds is driven by increasing rate of population, urban household size and rural household number, access to highways and variation in temperature. Drivers related to forest to shrubland conversion include increasing rate of population, access to rivers, highways and cities, and increased rate of precipitation. Lastly, shrimp ponds to bare soil conversion is driven by access to highway, cities and rivers, elevation and increasing rate of precipitation.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Atmospheric Sciences

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2017

Author dc:creator

• Shrestha, Suravi

Contributors dc:contributor

• Jain, Atul K.

• Bangladesh
• Land use land cover change
• Agriculture
• Shrimp farming
• Forest
• Socioeconomic factors
• Dynamics
• Drivers

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2017 Suravi Shrestha

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/97797

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/97797