Investigating Changes in Coastal Environment Using Internet-Based Geospatial Data

Abstract

The concerns of researchers and policy makers for the deteriorating condition of the coastal environments have increased in recent times. As the threats to the world today, such as, climate change, population pressure, urbanization and disasters are getting worse, it has become needful to give more attention to means of sustaining the human environment, especially the coastal areas. On the basis of this background, access to geospatial data through internet technology has become attractive, for investigating the impacts of dynamic processes on the coastal environment. This paper presents the result of investigation carried out in Okrika coastal areas of Rivers State, Nigeria. In particular, it discusses how internet-based geospatial data (for example; LandSat TM, ETM+ and Google Earth maps) of three epochs, were incorporated into open-source Geographic Information System (GIS), such as, Integrated Land and Water Information System (ILWIS), and applied to the investigation of land use/land cover (LU/LC) changes. The results obtained tend to show that between 1986-2007, 10.94% of the coastal areas was modified from water body to residential areas, 1.10% from residential areas to swamps, 0.42% from vegetation to water body and 0.93% from residential areas to water body. With these modifications, the economic mainstay of the people (marine, tourism and fishing activities) has been adversely affected. The research recommends that effective shoreline protection facility be put in place through government regulations in order to minimize further encroachment, particularly with regards to the water bodies. Also, high-resolution geospatial data as well as simple GIS applications should be made available on the internet, to enable more researchers contribute knowledge and solution to coastal crises, as well as improve collaboration within an interactive platform among policy and strategy formulators.