Remotely-sensed images and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) data were integrated into the SLEUTH cellular automata (CA) model to analyze land-use/land-cover dynamics in Chiang Mai city and its surrounds. The land-use and land-cover statistics, obtained from GIS data base and satellite images from 1952, 1977, 1989 and 2000 revealed rapid increased in urbanization during these periods. To understand the underlying causes of land-use and land-cover dynamics, remote sensing, GIS and modeling techniques were applied.

In this study, we have attempted to develop a land suitability model for saffron, an agronomic crop, which is economically viable, environmentally bearable and socially equitable at Khost Province of Afghanistan. The objective was to determine different land suitability classes for saffron cultivation using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Geographic Information System (GIS). A decision tree was developed encompassing the physical, economic and social criteria.

Outdoor water use is a key component in arid city water systems for achieving sustainable water use and ensuring water security. Using evapotranspiration (ET) calculations as a proxy for outdoor water consumption, the objectives of this research are to quantify outdoor water consumption of different land use and land cover types, and compare the spatio-temporal variation in water consumption between drought and wet years.

Over the past decades, the vast limestone mountain areas in southwestern China have suffered greatly from karst rocky desertification (KRD), which is a unique type of desertification caused by irrational land-use practices and has drawn increasing attention of international academic community. Characterizing soil erosion in this region is the key to understanding the escalating KRD problem and finding solution to it. The authors applied leveling method to study soil erosion process in the Huajiang Karst Canyon area between 1999 and 2003, and tried to relate it to KRD expansion.

Estimating regional carbon (C) stocks and understanding their dynamics is crucial, both from the perspective of sustainable landscape management and global change feedback. This study combines remote sensing techniques and a coupled GIS-CENTURY model to estimate regional biomass C stocks and SOC dynamics for Guiera senegalensis shrub communities in Senegal's Peanut Basin. A statistical model relating field-measured shrub aboveground biomass C at training plots to satellite image-derived shrub abundances was developed and used to estimate regional biomass C across a major part of the Basin.

Whether aggravated agricultural drought in the Sahel is related to a changing climate (meteorological drought, i.e., deficit of rainfall or unfavourable rainfall distribution) or to land use and land degradation (soil-water drought, i.e., decreased water infilitration and water holding capacity) is a much-debated issue.

The recent 9-billion-gallon increase in corn-based ethanol production, which resultedfrom a combination of rising gasoline prices and a suite of Federal bioenergy policies,provides evidence of how farmers altered their land-use decisions in response toincreased demand for corn. As some forecasts had suggested, corn acreage increasedmostly on farms that previously specialized in soybeans. Other farms, however, offsetthis shift by expanding soybean production.

The effects of agricultural practices on runoff water quality are a major concern worldwide, particularly where there is the potential to cause harm to aquatic ecosystems receiving the runoff. Cropping land has been identified as a major source of pollutants in the Fitzroy Basin, the largest catchment discharging into the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) lagoon. However, knowledge of pollutant generation rates in runoff from the dryland cropping (grains) industry's best management practices (BMPs) on Vertisol soils is limited, partly due to the scarce distribution of these soils worldwide.

Legislative changes during the 1960s–1970s granted user rights over wildlife to landowners in southern Africa, resulting in a shift from livestock farming to wildlife-based land uses. Few comprehensive assessments of such land uses on private land in southern Africa have been conducted and the associated benefits are not always acknowledged by politicians. Nonetheless, wildlife-based land uses are growing in prevalence on private land. In Namibia wildlife-based land use occurs over c. 287,000 km².

The urban forest provides valuable ecosystem services for enhancing human well-being. Its structure and composition determine the quantity and quality of these services. There has been little research on the heterogeneity in structure and composition of urban forests in the Australasian region, especially in the centre of a highly dynamic and rapidly urbanizing city. This paper quantifies the structure and the composition of the urban forest of Melbourne, Australia's city centre.

Cities are characterized by dynamic interactions between socio-economic and biophysical forces. Currently more than half of the global population reside in cities which influence the global biogeochemical cycles and climate change, substantially exacerbating pressures on urban pollution, water quality and food security, as well as operating costs for infrastructure development. Goods and services such as aesthetic values, water purification, nutrient recycling, and biological diversity, that urban ecosystems generate for the society, are critical to sustain.