MULTI-LEVEL LAND USE LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION USING GEOSPATIAL TECHNIQUES IN KORBA COAL FIELDS OF CHHATTISGARH INDIA.

The present study is conducted in the Korba Coal fields of Chhattisgarh. To classify the land use and land cover of study area at multi-level, various data sets have been used viz. LANDSAT-8 OLI, Sentinel- 2 and Google earth image. The study showed that the level-I classification has five broad land use and land cover classes such as forest, built-up area, degraded land, agriculture land, water bodies. Among five classes, the forest covered largest area followed by agriculture, degraded land, water bodies and built-up area. Of the total geographical area, the forest cover distributed in 3326.91 km² constituted about 50.36% of area. Agriculture area covered in 2010.18 km² accounting 30.43% of the total area, while degraded land constitutes about 15.49% area spread in 1023.62 km². In contrast, the water bodies covered in 2.12% area occupied 140.10 km², while built-up area spread only in 1.6% area spread in 106 km². The classification at Level III helped in site specific micro level planning and development, while level-I and level II classes used for regional planning and development of resources. The paper highlighted the advantages and disadvantages of multilevel classification using various sensors for sustainable planning and development of resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]