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Natural resources are under tremendous amounts of threat as a result of the expanding human population, which over time intensifies changes in Land use and Land cover (LULC). Understanding how various machine learning classifiers function is crucial as the demand for an accurate estimate of LULC from satellite images. The purpose of this research was to classify the LULC in the entire Karnataka state, using three distinct methods on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) namely RF (Random Forest), SVM (Support Vector Machine) and CART (Classification Regression Trees), are examples of machine learning techniques. The LULC is classified by the training sets using supervised classification. The NDVI (Normalized difference vegetation index) was assessed and used to increase classification accuracy. The LULC classification for the years 2015 to 2021 utilizes multi-temporal images like Sentinel-2, Landsat-8, and MODIS data with spatial resolution of 10 m, 30 m, and 250 m. Agricultural land, Built-up land, Forest land, Fallow land, wasteland, water body and others, are major LULC classes, it lies on a level I classification. According to the findings, the change % of agricultural land is high from 2015 (64.03%) to 2021 (67.81%), this roughly increased about 3.78% during the study year. While water bodies increased by 5.25 to 6.3%. Based on the results, the largest LULC group is agricultural land (122,789.4 km2 or 64.03%), followed by forest land (37,678.56 km2 or 19.65%). Increased built-up land in the studied area indicates extraordinarily rapid urban growth in major cities of the state. This research offers a reliable approach for comprehensive, automated, and LULC classification in Karnataka State. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The availability of productive land is significantly impacted by the global phenomenon of urbanization. The amount of land available for food production and other essential activities decreases as cities grow because the urban perimeter encroaches on rural and natural areas. Conducting research on urban sprawl analysis and land use land cover (LULC) change assessment is essential in ensuring sustainable urban growth. Bengaluru, a rapidly expanding metropolitan city, has a significant impact on the area around it, making it a prime location for this kind of study. In this study, authors sought to assess how urban sprawl affected LULC in the Bengaluru rural district that surrounds the city of Bengaluru. The study evaluated changes in LULC over a two-decade period using remote sensing data and GIS tools. Five LULC classes were used to categorize the study area: settlement, waterbody, vegetation, agriculture, and barren land. The maximum likelihood technique was used to classify Landsat images from three different time periods using the supervised image classification method in the ERDAS software. Accuracy assessment was used to gauge the classified images' accuracy. The study's important findings showed how the LULC classes in the study area have been negatively impacted by the urban sprawl. The study emphasizes the significance of ongoing research in LULC change assessment and urban sprawl analysis to ensure sustainable urban growth and safeguard the availability of productive land. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land degradation is a problem of grave concern and a major factor leading to it is soil erosion. Soil erosion and its rate are influenced by various factors intrinsic to the soil or related to the soil's external environment. These factors include rainfall, soil erodibility, topographic characteristics, crop cover, and conservation practices. The revised universal soil loss equation (RUSLE) is a well-renowned empirical formula used to compute a particular area's mean annual soil loss. Remote sensing (RS) and geographical information system (GIS) technologies make modeling and execution of RUSLE easy, reliable, and cost-effective. So, these were employed to compute the spatial distribution of soil erosion risk area in Nagavangala micro-watershed in Karnataka state, India. All the factors were generated using metrological data, CartoSat DEM, Quick bird imagery, and laboratory analysis data using GIS software and integrated in a GIS environment to estimate the soil loss rate. It was found that cropland (41.81%) was the dominant land use followed by agricultural plantation (41.5%) and scrubland (11.09%). The average annual soil loss of the watershed was estimated to be 9.80 t/ha/year. The average annual soil loss was highest in the area under scrubland (10.58 t/ha/year) followed by cropland (10.2 t/ha/year). The soil erosion map thus generated can serve as a basis for adopting suitable soil and water conservation measures in the watershed for sustainable management of the resources in it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Earth is frequently changed by natural occurrences and human actions that have threatened our environment to a certain extent. Therefore, accurate and timely monitoring of transformations at the surface of the Earth is crucial for precisely facing their harmful effects and consequences. This paper aims to perform a change detection (CD) analysis and assessment of the Dakshina Kannada region, being one of the coastal districts of Karnataka, India. The spatial and temporal variations in land use and land cover (LULC) are being monitored and examined from the data received as LULC maps from the National Remote Sensing Agency, Indian Space Research Organization, India. The time-series data from advanced wide-field sensor (AWiFS) Resourcesat2 satellite as LULC maps (1:250k) are analyzed using a deep learning approach with an encoder–decoder architecture with dual-attention modules for the change analysis. The model provides an overall accuracy and meanIOU(intersection over union) of 94.11% and 74.1%. The LULC maps from 2005 to 2018 (13 years) are utilized to decide the variations in the LULC, including urban development, agricultural variations, vegetation dynamics, forest areas, barren land, littoral swamp, and water bodies, current fallow, etc. The multiclass area-wise changes in terms of percentage show a decline in most LULC classes, which raises a point of concern for the environmental safety of the considered area, which is highly exposed to coastal flooding due to increased urbanization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically marginalized foods, which occupy the social periphery, and often function as a bulwark in times of hunger, are increasingly being rediscovered and revalued as niche commodities. From açaí to quinoa, the move from marginal to miracle is often tied to larger narratives surrounding sustainable development, resilience to climate change, and traditional foodways. This article analyses the recent move towards millet production and consumption in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. Focusing upon one of the grain's chief proponents, I explore how narratives surrounding millets are grounded in conceptions of cultural authenticity and bioregionalism. Drawing upon human geographer's analyses of the turn towards the 'local' in food activism, I contribute to the development of critical bioregionalism, an emerging theoretical framework that explores how questions of value, identity, political economy, and histories of land use intersect to structure our understandings of marginal foods and their resurgence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Global climate change and its impact on crop water requirement have widely discussed in recent years. In the present century, climate change had become a significant concern and atmospheric temperature is the dominant climatic factor that indicates the changes in both regional and global scales. This study was undertaken to evaluate the trend and predict the changes in crop water requirement under various climate change scenarios. Methods: The statistical nonparametric Mann-Kendall test and Sen’s slope used to identify trend in the data series. In this study ArcGIS V. xx software used for investigating spatial patterns in data. CROPWAT-8.0 model used for calculation of crop water requirement under various climate change scenarios. Total six climate change scenarios were considered for assessment. Result: The crop water requirement (ETc ) of pigeonpea estimated and exhibited an increasing trend and a decreasing trend in study area in the past 35 years. The spatial distribution maps reveal that the distribution of ETc is found an increasing trend in all the scenarios to reference ETc . An increasing trend of ETc of pigeon pea was observed in all the places under various climate change scenarios. It was suggested to promote rainwater harvesting, soil and water conservation and increase ground water recharge in the study area to minimize the risk of yield reduction due to the availability of minimum water under changing climatic condition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zoning laws that restrict rural land to agricultural production pose an important institutional barrier to industrial development. We study the effects of the Industrial Areas (IA) program in Karnataka, India, which rezoned agricultural land for industrial use, but without the economic incentives common with other place-based policies. We find that the program caused a large increase in firm creation and employment in villages overlapping the IAs. Moreover, the surrounding areas experienced spillover effects, with workers shifting from agricultural to non-agricultural employment, and entrepreneurs establishing numerous small-scale service sector and agricultural firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rivers are vital freshwater resources that cater to the needs of society. The burgeoning population and the consequent land-use changes have altered the hydrologic regime with biophysical and chemical integrity changes. This necessitates understanding the land-use dynamics, flow dynamics, hydrologic regime, and water quality of riverine ecosystems. An assessment of the land-use dynamics in the Aghanashini River basin reveals a decline in vegetation cover from 86.06% (1973) to 50.78% (2018). The computation of eco-hydrological indices (EHI) highlights that the sub-watersheds with native vegetation had higher infiltration (and storage) than water loss due to evapotranspiration and meeting the societal demand. The computation of water quality index helped to assess the overall water quality across seasons. The study provides insights into hydrology linkages with the catchment landscape dynamics to the hydrologists and land-use managers. These insights would aid in the prudent management of river basins to address water stress issues through watershed treatment involving afforestation with native species, appropriate cropping, and soil conservation measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a combined seismic risk assessment of Mangalore city, considering seismic hazard and Land Use (LU) patterns. Probabilistic seismic hazard analysis was carried out considering different source models and attenuation relations to predict Peak Ground Acceleration at every square kilometer. LU of the area was assessed using GIS tools with the built-in supervised Gaussian maximum likelihood algorithm on processed remote sensing data from temporal Landsat images. The risk map showed the concentration of built-up area South-West, toward the sea and the seismic hazard following an increasing trend from the coast to further inland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land Use Land Cover (LULC) change monitoring plays very significant role in planning, policy making, management programs required for development activities at regional levels of any country. This study is an attempt to monitor LULC change of Vijayapura taluk, Karnataka, India for the period of 25 years from 1995 to 2021 using Remote Sensing (RS) and Geographic Information System (GIS). Satellite Images from Sentinel-2A MSI (Multispectral Imager), Landsat-5TM (Thematic Mapper) are used to generate LULC maps. Vegetation Change in the study area is computed using Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and results show that vegetation rate is increased from 0.6% in 1995 to 27.5% in 2021. Supervised Classification is carried out by using Maximum Likelihood Classification (MLC). 5 major classes considered for classification are namely: Waterbodies, Cropland/Vegetation, Fallow Land, Built-up Area and Barren Land. ArcGIS software tool is used for implementing the proposed study. Google Earth Pro used for accuracy assessment which is done by taking ground truth values for corresponding Classifications. Results show that the proposed system is able to achieve 88.16% of overall accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent past agroforestry systems have been recognized as sustainable land use system over conventional agriculture. However, the major obstacle in up scaling of this tree based land use systems is the difficulty in quantification and demonstration of the ecological and economical sustainability as compared to agriculture. Nevertheless, energy analysis is being widely used at global, national and regional scale to assess the sustainability of system production as it evaluates the system components on common units and also helps to understand the resource use and production efficiency of tree based farming system. Therefore, the present investigation was undertaken to assess the economics and energy use efficiency of different neem (Azadirachta indica A. Juss.) and teak (Tectona grandis L.f.) based agroforestry systems in rainfed and irrigated ecosystems respectively in north-eastern dry zone of Karnataka, India. The economic analysis of neem based agroforestry systems under rainfed condition revealed higher net returns and B:C ratio with crop alone (control) (515 $ ha−1 year−1, 2.00 respectively) over different agroforestry systems. While, in teak based agroforestry systems under irrigated ecosystem higher B:C ratio were recorded (4.07 to 5.71) over control (2.87). However, energy analysis revealed that both neem (3.99 to 4.15) and teak based agroforestry systems (4.48 to 7.74) were energetically superior to control (3.32 and 4.21 respectively). Energy analysis appeared to be the most appropriate method to assess the agroforestry systems rather than economics or life cycle assessment though intangible benefits of tree based land use system are not considered in the former. Therefore, integrated approach involving both ecological and economical assessment is suggested to quantify the sustainability and productivity across types of system and ecological situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study was conducted in Joida Taluk of Uttar Kannada district, Karnataka to assess the land use land cover (LULC) and carbon sequestration of the forest during the year 2019-20. The ground truth data for different LULC was collected using GPS, and data was used for classification of IRS LISS 4 data using maximum likelihood classifier in ERDAS imagine software. The sample plots of 23.2 m X 23.2 m were laid out randomly in forests and growth parameters (tree height and diameter) were recorded, and biomass was estimated using the standard formula. There are eight LULC classes' viz., dense forest, moderately dense forest, open/sparse forest, scrub forest, agriculture, settlement, horticulture plantation and waterbody. The overall a ccuracy of the classification was 97.09%. The total biomass in Joida Taluk from four forest classes (dense forest, moderately de nse forest, open/sparse forest and scrub forest) was 44.16 million m3 and carbon sequestered was 15.57 million tonnes. The NDVI values ranging from -0.23 to 0.74, indicating a higher value for dense forest. Based on this study, it is concluded that forests have potential in carbon sequestration, which in turn helps in mitigating the climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study has been conducted for land use and land cover classification by using SAR data. The study included examining of ALOS 2 PALSAR L- band quad pol (HH, HV, VH and VV) SAR data for LULC classification. The SAR data was pre-processed first which included multilook, radiometric calibration, geometric correction, speckle filtering, SAR Polarimetry and decomposition. For land use land cover classification of ALOS-2- PALSAR data sets, the supervised Random forest classifier was used. Training samples were selected with the help of ground truth data. The area was classified under 7 different classes such as dense forest, moderate dense forest, scrub/sparse forest, plantation, agriculture, water body, and settlements. Among them the highest area was covered by dense forest (108647ha) followed by horticulture plantation (57822 ha) and scrub/Sparse forest (49238 ha) and lowest area was covered by moderate dense forest (11589 ha). Accuracy assessment was performed after classification. The overall accuracy of SAR data was 80.36% and Kappa Coefficient was 0.76. Based on SAR backscatter reflectance such as single, double, and volumetric scattering mechanism different land use classes were identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The morphological, physical and physico-chemical characteristics of soils in Sollapura sub-watershed of Chikmagalur district in Karnataka have been studied. The district comprises of 7 taluks of which Tarikere comes under southern transition zone. Tarikere talu have wide range of climate variation from perhumid to semi-arid. The study revealed that the soils had colours in the hue of 10YR to 5 YR, well to poorly drained, slightly acidic to moderately alkaline, low to high in organic carbon and low to medium in cation exchange capacity with wide textural variations. The soils on gently sloping topography exhibit the development of argillic horizon (Bt). The soils have been classified as Alfisols soil order and Ustalfs at suborder level due to the presence of ustic soil moisture regime. On the basis of the major soil constraints, sustainable land use plan for the micro-watershed has also been suggested for their better management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Streamflow can be affected by a number of aspects related to land use and can vary promptly as those factors change. Urbanization, deforestation, mining, agricultural practices and economic growth are some of the factors related to these land use changes which alter the stream flow. In the present study, the impact of land use land cover change (LULC) on stream flow is studied by using SWAT model for Tungabhadra river basin, located in the state of Karnataka, India. Tungabhadra river originates in the Western Ghats of Karnataka and flows towards north-east and joins the river Krishna. The land use maps of 1993, 2003 and 2018 are used for assessing the stream flow changes with respect to LULC. Calibration and validation of the model for streamflow was carried out using the SUFI-2 algorithm in SWAT-CUP for the years 1983–1993 and 1994–2000 respectively. Statistical parameters namely Coefficient of Determination (R2) & Nash–Sutcliffe (N-S) were used to assess the efficiency and performance of the SWAT model. It was found that the observed and simulated streamflow values are closely matching, which in turn projects that the model results are acceptable. The calibrated model was used for simulation of future dynamic land use scenario to assess the impact on streamflow. The results can be used for conservation of water and soil management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wildlife corridors are critical in maintaining ecological processes and wildlife management, but they are fragmented and degraded due to various land-use practices. It is crucial to restore wildlife corridors through participation of communities/institutions of the landscape. Ironically, however, most of the proposed conservation plans are devoid of them in conservation and policy-making. Therefore, valuing the onus of people and their inputs to restore and manage wildlife corridors would be a practical strategy. We are addressing this 'restoration initiative' in the Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Tiger Reserve, Karnataka, India by integrating knowledge from social and ecological sciences. The preliminary result indicates that, people and institutions from the landscape are willing to support the restoration efforts. This initiative would emerge as one of the successful, actionoriented and policy-driven projects in this landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urbanization is a phenomenon with unprecedented population growth coupled with unplanned developmental activities which exerted heavy pressure on land and the resources surrounding them, leading to serious environmental problems. Identification and analysis of land-use/land-cover change in advance along with the study of built up area growth would help in effective infrastructure planning and resource management. Udupi and its surroundings are experiencing unprecedented urbanization in recent times due to concentrated developmental resulted in the increase in population and consequent pressure on infrastructure, natural resources and ultimately giving rise to increase in built up area which causes a plethora of serious challenges such as climate change, enhanced greenhouse gases emissions, urban heat Island effects, etc. This research aims to evaluate the use of various satellite data for indicating built up area growth in urban areas of Udupi Taluk during the years 2000, 2006 and 2010 with an attempt to analyze contribution of change in land cover types for urbanization growth which causes temperature variation using Geoinformation technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the impacts of Neolithic Period (c. 5000–3200 cal. BP) and Iron Age (c. 3200–2300 cal. BP) occupation and land use on the geomorphology of residual hills that punctuate an expansive planation surface in central Karnataka, South India. Analyses of archaeological survey data, soil and regolith profiles, remotely sensed metrics of hill morphology and distributions of soil and sediment, and paleoecological data indicate that cultural land use altered the morphology of these features and the distribution of soils on them, and consequently impacted the processes by which they continued to develop. Statistical regression models indicate that archaeological evidence for ancient land use is a significant explanatory variable for the proportion of remaining soil cover and exposed residual rock on the sampled hills. Moreover, multivariate regression models explaining soil removal on the hills are effective when including archaeological proxies for ancient land use along with other geomorphological variables. The combined effects of intensified agro-pastoral land use, vegetation changes, and variations in climatic humidity during the mid-Holocene to late Holocene appear to have facilitated erosional conditions that outpaced subsurface weathering. These findings imply that the refinement of models for the development of residual hills in South India, where early paradigms for explaining the evolution of such landforms were formalized, should consider the effects of Holocene land use where applicable. The findings also suggest that recent efforts to understand the unique ecology of these landforms should account for historical human land use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land use/land cover changes around four water bodies situated in and near Davangere city (Karnataka) during the period 1 970-2005 were analysed using satellite data and Survey of India Topo maps. Using Geographical Information System (GIS), the detailed analysis revealed that the area under agriculture and settlements increased whereas the scrub land decreased around TV-station reservoir. Around Yelebethur lake, the built up land area increased and the scrub land has been converted to agricultural land. Land cover around Bathi lake also recorded an increase in built up land whereas Hadadi lake surroundings show increased agricultural land and a decline in fallow land. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Cauvery basin of Karnataka State encompasses a range of land cover types, from dense forest areas and plantations in the Western Ghats hills, to fertile agricultural lands in the river valley. Recent demographic changes, rapid economic development and urbanization have led to the conversion of vast stretches of forested land into plantations and permanent agriculture. We examine the human drivers of forest cover change between 2001 and 2006, using MODIS 250 m data at multiple spatial scales of nested administrative units i.e., districts and taluks. Population density does not emerge as a major driver of forest distribution or deforestation. Protected areas and landscape accessibility play a major role in driving the distribution of stable forest cover at different spatial scales. The availability of forested land for further clearing emerges as a major factor impacting the distribution of deforestation, with new deforestation taking place in regions with challenging topography. This research highlights the importance of using a regional approach to study land cover change, and indicates that the drivers of forest change may be very different in long settled landscapes, for which little is known in comparison to frontier forests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An attempt was made to study the influence of various factors such as geology, landforms, slope, soil, landuse/cover on the development of the drainage network. To compare and evaluate drainage networks developed in various geologic terrains, differing in rock type and structure, three sub-basins of the Bhadra river basin, located in Chikmagalur district, Karnataka, India were selected for the study. Quantitative morphometric analysis was carried out for both linear aspects and areal aspects for all three sub-basins. The applicability of Horton's laws was also studied. Each of the quantitative parameters was interrelated with thematic details derived from remote sensing data. The results of the study indicate that the drainage characteristics are entirely different for all three sub-basins. The study has also established the applicability of Horton's laws pertaining to quantitative morphometry of the sub-basins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper analyses the prospects for establishing afforestation and reforestation Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects in Karnataka State, India. Building on multi-disciplinary fieldwork, the aim is to: (i) establish what type of plantations and forests that would best suit a forest-based project activity, considering global climate benefits and local sustainable development objectives; (ii) identify the parameters that are important for ensuring sustainable development at the local level and (iii) develop a transparent ranking tool for the assessment of possible forest-based project activities. Using equal weights for the ranking parameters and a 30-year time horizon, the ranking shows that plantations managed with the shortest rotation period (5 years) would be most suitable for forest-based project activities. However, the performance of individual forest-based project activities will depend on local conditions, which need to be reflected in the weighting procedure. Sensitivity analysis shows that when weights are varied, other forest types can become the preferred option. Based on a combination of the sensitivity analysis and results from the fieldwork, it can be concluded that successful implementation of forest-based project activities will require local participation and are likely to involve multiple forest products and environmental services demanded by the local community. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Setting a baseline for carbon stock changes in forest and land use sector mitigation projects is an essential step for assessing additionality of the project. There are two approaches for setting baselines namely, project-specific and regional baseline. This paper presents the methodology adopted for estimating the land available for mitigation, for developing a regional baseline, transaction cost involved and a comparison of project-specific and regional baseline. The study showed that it is possible to estimate the potential land and its suitability for afforestation and reforestation mitigation projects, using existing maps and data, in the dry zone of Karnataka, southern India. The study adopted a three-step approach for developing a regional baseline, namely: (i) identification of likely baseline options for land use, (ii) estimation of baseline rates of land-use change, and (iii) quantification of baseline carbon profile over time. The analysis showed that carbon stock estimates made for wastelands and fallow lands for project-specific as well as the regional baseline are comparable. The ratio of wasteland Carbon stocks of a project to regional baseline is 1.02, and that of fallow lands in the project to regional baseline is 0.97. The cost of conducting field studies for determination of regional baseline is about a quarter of the cost of developing a project-specific baseline on a per hectare basis. The study has shown the reliability, feasibility and cost-effectiveness of adopting regional baseline for forestry sector mitigation projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessment of stream flow dynamics reveals principal characteristics of a river basin as it results from a complex blend of hydrological drivers. Earlier studies suggest climatic parameters and land use changes are the major causes of river flow changes in the basin. However, introduction of large-scale irrigation and other irrigation management activities in the basin will also play a crucial role in stream flow variations. The present work aims to understand the contributions of these drivers towards decreasing river flows in the Malaprabha river basin, Karnataka, India. Results of the Mann-Kendall trend test showed non-significant decreasing trends in annual and seasonal rainfall patterns in the area. The effect of Land Use /Land Cover (LU/LC) change on stream flows was analyzed using decadal LU/LC maps for the period 1985,1995 and 2005 as inputs to the Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) hydrological model. Further, the effect of Malaprabha reservoir on stream flows was analyzed by performing SWAT simulations for with and without reservoir conditions. The comparative analysis showed that there is negligible contribution of decadal LULC on river flows. However, the presence of the reservoir was found to be contributing 43% of stream flow variability. This study revealed that at catchment scale reservoir storage and related operational activities affects the river flows more significantly than LULC changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]