Gendered Activities and Vegetation Change: A Study of Vegetation of Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo District

Abstract

This paper looks at the change in the vegetation cover in Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo District in the Northern Region of Ghana as contributed to by gendered domestic economic activities. The study became necessary due to the increasing dependence on the biodiversity for fuel wood (mainly), timber and livestock grazing, amidst persistent bush burning in the district. The study adopted Remote Sensing and GIS technologies for the determination of the changes in vegetation. It considered 2000 and 2015 as base and current years respectively for the determination of the change. Specifically, it used ArcGIS, ENVI and NDVI software to process the LandSat 7 images it acquired from the study area. The study sought to determine the nature of vegetation of the area in each of the years, determine the extent of change and explain the possible drivers to the change. The results showed that vegetation decreased inversely with the increases in settlement, bare land, and burnt land sizes. The main drivers of the change were identified as human related – gendered roles of women, urbanization and drive for development. It concluded that the vegetation of Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo District detected at 25% is rather a drastic change, given the short time period of six years.

Keywords: Change detection, Pixel, Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo, Gendered roles.