Analysis of Land Use Change in the N'ZI Watershed of Côte d'Ivoire Using Landsat Satellite Images

Abstract

Uncontrolled population growth and strong industrialization are enormous pressures on natural resources. To monitor land use changes in the N'ZI watershed, remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) were used from three satellite images: Landsat 4 and 5 (1986), Landsat 7 (2000), and Landsat 8 (2020). The method of supervised classification and calculation of spectral indices was used in this work. The results of the analysis identified six land use classes that changed over the 1986–2000, 2000–2020, and 1986–2020 periods. Water surfaces showed a decrease from −64.95% to −52.47% over the period (2000–2020 and 1986–2020). The forest class showed an average decrease of −86.93%. The savannah class had a reduction of −3.97% and the agricultural class of −9.30% between 1986 and 2020. All this desertification has been to the advantage of the great increase of dwellings-bare soil of 373.63% and of the weakly covered grounds of 10.60%. These results allowed the detection of different spatial and temporal changes in the N'ZI watershed, creating an awareness to control land occupancy.