Analysing past land use land cover change and CA-Markov-based future modelling in the Middle Suluh Valley, Northern Ethiopia

This paper evaluates the past land use land cover (LULC) change and simulates the future change using Landsat images in northern Ethiopia. A supervised classification method with a maximum likelihood algorithm was employed to detect the past changes using ENVI 5.3 software. Moreover, a Cellular Automata (CA)-Makrov model was used to simulate from 2015 to 2030. In the period 1985-2015, the statistical result shows an increase of agricultural land (AL) by 32.3 km(2) (19.2%) and settlement (ST) by 51.6 km(2) (345.2%). Most of the increases were gained from shrub-bush land (SBL) which showed a decline of 61.8 km(2) (49.4%). However, in the simulation model of 2030, an increase of SBL (47.08 km(2)) and grass land by 12.38 km(2) was predicted. The consideration of socioeconomic and biophysical factors in the simulation model results different trend compare to the historical LULC change that support to landuse managers and planners.