Land cover change analysis of Besitang watershed

Abstract

Besitang watershed is part of some watershed in Langkat Regency. Watershed area has many important functions for the area itself and the surrounding. Land cover and use should properly so the function of the watershed could be maintained. The research was done to find out the change of land cover between year 2008 and 2018 in Besitang Watershed of Langkat. Supervised classification was done to Landsat images of those years. There are 8 land cover classes which are forest, mangrove, water body, bare land, settlement, plantation, shrub and fishpond. In year 2008 the largest area in Besitang Watershed is forest which is 34,730.63 ha or 35.99% of the area. The largest land cover area in 2018 is plantation with the area of 39,928.31 ha or 41.38%. There is a decrease of mangrove area between year 2008 and 2018 in 5.86%. The largest conversion of mangrove is into plantation. The change of mangrove into other land uses should be evaluated in relation with its condition and functions.