Integration Remote Sensing and GIS for Land Use Land Cover Mapping Kordofan States, Sudan (A Case Study).

Abstract

This study was carried out in an area lying in three states namely, Northern Kordofan, Western Kordofan, and Southern Kordofan. The northern part of this area lies in the arid zone with sandy moving soil, which is affected by desertification. The southern part of it lies in the poor savanna, with clay and sandy clay soil whose land covers were conserved and scarcely affected with the desertification processes. The purpose of this research was to study the way in which land cover types are recorded in the landsat data, and the visual interpretation of these landsat data for the land vegetation cover, drainage networks, and soil cover types. Another purpose of the study is to use mosaics whose scenes were of different band combination such as the false color images and the true color images, taking into account the purpose of the band combinations. This is because the economic situation in the Sudan will not continuously allow the researchers to find the images and the combinations they need for their studies. The research also considers detecting the change in the land use and land cover over the area in three different periods, to see to what extend this area is affected by the desertification. The three periods studied were 1958, 1972, and the period immediately after the drought of 1984-1985. The study also endeavoring to use the Geographical Information Systems to replace the traditional cartographic processes for map production the maps in such a way that these maps can be kept in digital form rather than keeping them on the zinc plates as it was usually done. The zinc plates are subject to physical damages and chemical reactions, which in turn changes the quality and geometric properties of the data. Keeping the maps in digital form simplifies the processes of updating them and comparing data of different dates. Also the digital form of the data is adequate to subsequent comparisons of land cover changes. The research also looks into establishing reference points (sample points) by the use of the GIS technology for monitoring the change in the land cover for longer periods in the future.