Detection of Human-Induced Land Cover Changes in Nimbia Forest Reserve, Kaduna State, Nigeria

Abstract

Nimbia Forest Reserve was established in 1957 as a plantation site to increase the productivity and curb desertification of the semi-arid zone of the Northern Guinea Savannah of Nigeria. But human activities has been acknowledged as a vital factor militating against the realization of this noble objective. This study attempts the use of GIS and Remote Sensing in mapping land cover in the study area between 1986, 1998 and 2007 so as to detect the changes that may have taken place in the study area between these periods as a result of human activities. The study utilized data from field surveys, remote sensed data and geographical information system technique, four main methods of data analysis were adopted in this study namely calculation of the Area in hectares of the resulting land cover types for each study year and subsequently comparing the results, Markov Chain and Cellular Automata Analysis for predicting change, Overlay Operations and Maximum Likelihood Classification. Subsequently, an attempt was made at projecting the observed land cover changes. The result obtained showed that some features will be lost to other features and possible reasons for that were evaluated. Recommendation were put forward to help curb the problem.

Keywords: Land cover, Forest, Remote sensing, GIS, Human activities