scholarly journals Climate, soil and land-use based land suitability evaluation for oil palm production in Ghana

2016 ◽  
Vol 81 ◽  
pp. 1-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiemen Rhebergen ◽  
Thomas Fairhurst ◽  
Shamie Zingore ◽  
Myles Fisher ◽  
Thomas Oberthür ◽  
...  
2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sumbangan Baja ◽  
Samsu Arif ◽  
Risma Neswati

Agricultural land use planning should always be guided by a reliable tool to ensure effective decision making in the allocation of land use and activities. The primary aim of this study is to develop a user friendly system on a spatial basis for agricultural land suitability evaluation of four groups of agriculture commodities, including food crops, horticultural crops, perennial (plantation) crops, grazing, and tambak (fish ponds) to guide land use planning. The procedure used is as follows: (i) conducting soil survey based on generated land mapping units; (ii) developing soil database in GIS; and (iii) designing a user friendly system. The data bases of the study were derived from satellite imagery, digital topographic map, soil characteristics at reconnaissance scale, as well as climate data. Land suitability evaluation in this study uses the FAO method. The study produces a spatial based decision support tool called SUFIG-Wilkom that can give decision makers sets of information interactively for land use allocation purposes.This user friendly system is also amenable to various operations in a vector GIS, so that the system may accommodate possible additional assessment of other land use types.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (23) ◽  
pp. 10134
Author(s):  
Shouqiang Yin ◽  
Jing Li ◽  
Jiaxin Liang ◽  
Kejing Jia ◽  
Zhen Yang ◽  
...  

This study was aimed at optimizing the weighted linear combination method (WLC) for agricultural land suitability evaluation (ALSE) through indicator selection, weight determination, and classification of overall suitability scores in Handan, China. Handan is a representative research area with distinct agricultural advantages and regional differences in land use, where the expansion of construction land has led to a rapid decrease of agricultural land in recent years. Natural factors (topography, climate, soil conditions, and vegetation cover) and socioeconomic factors (land use and spatial accessibility) were selected to establish a more comprehensive evaluation system. The index weight was calculated by the mutual information between index suitability and current land use. The consistency index was used to identify the boundary value dividing the overall suitability score into a suitable category and unsuitable category in each sub-region. The results demonstrated that the optimized WLC-ALSE model outperformed the comparison models using conventional methods in terms of the consistency between the evaluation results and current land use. Owing to the increasing limitations of topography, soil conditions, spatial accessibility, and land use, the proportions of suitable land in Zone 1, Zone 2, and Zone 3 were 77.4%, 67.5%, and 30.9%, respectively. The agricultural land unsuitable for agriculture (14.5%) was less than non-agricultural land suitable for agriculture (7.4%), indicating that agricultural land had low growth potential in Handan. Finally, specific recommendations were made to improve agricultural land suitability, alleviate land use conflicts, and further optimize the model. The results can provide effective guidance for WLC-ALSE and land use decision-making for sustainable agriculture.


2016 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wahyunto Wahyunto ◽  
Sofyan Ritung ◽  
Wahyu Wahdini ◽  
Fahmuddin Agus

Tree farming such as coconut, cocoa, coffee, rubber, and rambutan was dominant in the west coast of Aceh prior to tsunami. The farming is not only important for sustainable livelihood, but also for superior environmental protection. During the tsunami, considerable portion of this ‘green infrastructure’ was devastated. Therefore, a scientifically based land suitability evaluation is needed for supporting the redesign and  reconstruction of the tree-based farming. The objectives of this research were to evaluate the current physical condition of the area and develop recommendation of land suitability for tree crops farming in the area. Field survey for inventory and evaluation of land characteristics was conducted in 2006, 15 months after the tsunami. Land suitability evaluation was conducted by matching field survey data and soil sample analyses in every mapping unit with crop growth requirements. The land suitability map was further matched with the district development plan, existing land uses and land status. The resulted land use recommendation map showed that the marine ecosystem along the coastal line was most suitable for coconut, cacao, coffee, and casuarinas. The recommended tree crops for the ancient sandy beach were areca nut, coconut, rambutan, mango, rubber and oil palm; and for the alluvial ecosystem were coconut, cacao, areca nut, mango, and bread fruit. Peatland of less than 3 m thick was marginally suitable for oil palm and rubber, while those thicker than 3 m were recommended for conservation due to its fragile ecosystem. In the undulating tectonic plain, the suitable tree crops were rubber, oil palm, coconut, and rambutan.


Biologia ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 61 (19) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Jafarzadeh ◽  
Goldasteh Abbasi

AbstractAn area suitability assessment for crop production requires a considerable effort, which can provide necessary information for optimum land use. Agricultural land use has benefited significantly from the use of suitability systems in recent years. These systems have jointly showed their capabilities in the evaluation and assessment of suitable sites for a variety of crops.In the present study and research work land suitability evaluation (qualitative classification) has been determined for onion, potato, maize and alfalfa in Khalat pushan research station of Tabriz University in East Azerbaijan by using of Simple Limitation method (SLM), Limitation Method regarding Number and Intensity (LMNI) and parametric (PM) such as square root and storie methods. Climate, soil and landscape qualities and their characteristics which most influence crop suitability have been combined by the adopted methodology. In this study economic factors have been excluded and moderate management has been assumed. The use of different methods showed that the most important limitation factors are climate, lime, pH, OM, texture and gravel alone or in combinations. Evaluation indicates that SLM and LMNI show similar suitability classes, which confirms the previous findings for several crops by other researchers. However, in many cases the use of parametric methods, especially the square root method revealed to be more realistic in showing the distinguished suitability classes in many cases. Therefore, based on the obtained results (especially by the square root method), the cultivation of alfalfa, potato and onion can be recommended, except for soil profile 2, which is not suitable (N2) for onion.


2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 287-296 ◽  
Author(s):  
Feras M. Ziadat ◽  
Kais A. Sultan

AbstractLand suitability analysis is very important to assess and propose the most suitable land-use options. The reliability of land suitability evaluation is controlled by choosing the most limiting land characteristics and their ratings for the proposed land utilization types (LUTs). This study aims at examining the possibility of using current land use and farmers' knowledge as a starting point to suggest and/or modify land evaluation criteria, and to improve the land suitability evaluation process. The potential suitability of land for five LUTs (open range, improved range, rainfed barley, drip-irrigated vegetables and drip-irrigated trees) was evaluated near Al-Mafraq in Jordan using the maximum limitation method. The results indicated variable agreement levels between potential land suitability and current land use for different LUTs. Sixteen farms were selected to represent different cases of disagreement between potential suitability and current land use and were visited to explore the farmers' improved management practices adopted to overcome land-use limitations. Using proposed criteria, only 1% of the study area was highly suitable for drip irrigation, whereas most of the area was moderately or marginally suitable for other uses. This represents the conventional land evaluation procedures, which, in most cases, overlook the farmers' knowledge and practices that are adopted in a particular area to overcome biophysical limitations. The ratings for different land characteristics were modified based on comparisons with current land use, and by referring to farmers’ adopted management practices. Using modified criteria, the highly suitable area for drip-irrigated vegetables increased by 18% and the highly suitable area for drip-irrigated trees increased by 25%. The results emphasized that the consideration of the farmer's indigenous knowledge and current land use improve the land evaluation process, which leads to better utilization of limited land resources in fragile environments.


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