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Project Name : National Wasteland Monitoring Using Multi-Temporal Satellite

Data
Project Sponsored by/ Project done for : National Remote Sensing Centre, Indian
Space Research Organisation, Department of Space, Government of India, Hyderabad.
Sponsored by Ministry of Rural Development, and Department of Land Resources,
Government of India, New Delhi.

1. Introduction :
The emerging needs for the basic necessities of mankind, during the post Green
Revolution era, brought into limelight, the issue of sustainable productivity without
affecting the productivity of resources. This fact drew the attention in all the planning
activities. A planned geo-spatial approach is to ensure resources utilization and
management. In this context, spatial information on wastelands is a necessary prerequisite in planning, utilizing and management of natural resources so as to meet the
future demands of the ever-growing population. In order to understand the dynamics of
the transformations, there is urgent need to monitor the changes in wastelands in terms
of their spatial extent and distribution. With the advent of high-resolution satellite data,
accurate and precise mapping and monitoring of various wasteland categories is easily
possible.
The wasteland map on 1:1 million scale of the States and Union Territories of
India provided gross estimation of wastelands and their spatial distribution. Due to small
scale (1:1 million) and low resolution of the satellite data used (80 meters), any isolated
patch of land, less than 100 ha could not be mapped. Moreover, due to small scale, the
above maps could not be used for massive reclamation at micro-level. Therefore, there
is a necessity of mapping different categories of wastelands on large scale (1:50,000),
which could enable the identification of the wastelands. Ministry of Rural development
(MRD) has been funding many wastelands reclamation programmes to bring them under
green cover. MRD had requested NRSC to take up task of mapping of wastelands using
LISS-III data of 2005-2006 to monitor the wastelands over a period of three years i.e.,
between 2003 and 2006.

2. Objectives :
1. Updation of the spatial information on wasteland mapped during 2003 using three
season satellite data of 2005-2006.
2. Identification and delineation of new areas under wastelands
3. Identification of areas where reclamation has been done
4. Extraction of statistics and summation in the form of report and atlas

Conventional inputs used for the project:


Survey of India toposheets, Bureau of Economics and Statistics report of
Maharashtra State, Land use / Land cover maps of Maharashtra under LU/LC 50 K
2005-06.
Satellite Data used:
IRS-P6 (Resourcesat-1) LISS III satellite data of three season viz. kharif, rabi and
zaid for 2005-2006 (IRS- P6/LISS III/Oct2005,Jan2006,April2006).
3. Methodology :
The methodology essentially involves geo-referencing of satellite data,
delineation of wasteland categories through on-screen visual interpretation technique
based on legacy data and limited ground truth, quality check, harmonization with land
degradation, land use/ land cover datasets and seamless database creation.

METHODOLOGY
MULTI-SEASON
IRS P6 LISS III
RECTIFIED
DATA (2005-2006)
STANDARD
CLASSIFICATION

LEGACY DATA
Land Use / Cover
Biodiversity

GROUND DATA
COLLECTION AND
INTERACTION

MAP
TEMPLATE
COLOR / SYMBOL
SCHEME

WASTELAND
VECTOR LAYER
2003 ( Re-projected)

TOPOGRAPHICAL

(T1)

MAPS

DATA SOURCES

DATA
INTERPRETATION
MODIFICATION OF
THEMATIC DETAILS

EXTRACTION OF
VILLAGE
BOUNDARIES

QUALITY EVALUATION
& ACCURACY
ASSESSMENT

GEO-DATA BASE
CREATION & DATA
INTEGRATION
METADATA

UPDATED
WASTE LAND
INFORMATION (T2)

MOSAICS DIST./STATE

TABLES/GRAPHS

WASTELANDS
MONITORING
(T2 T1)

ANALYSIS
REPORT

Wasteland classification with feature codes


The classification scheme used for delineation of wasteland categories is
given in Table I :
Table I : Classification Scheme
LU_CODE

DESCRIPTION

050200
050202
050203
050300
050301
050302
060000
060201
060202
050100
050102
050103
090100
090101
090102
030400
030401
030402
040401
020304
050400
050402
050401
050404
050405
050403
010300
010303
010307
050500
080000

Gullied/Ravinous land
Medium ravinous
Deep/very deep ravinous
Scrubland (Land with or without scrub)
Land with dense scrub
Land with open scrub
Waterlogged and marshy land
Permanent
Seasonal
Land affected by salinity/alkalinity
Moderate
Strong
Shifting cultivation
Current Jhum
Abandoned Jhum
Scrub forest (Under utilized degraded notified forest land)
Scrub dominated
Agricultural land inside notified forest land
Degraded pastures/grazing land
Degraded land under plantation crops
Sands (coastal/desert /riverine)
Sands Coastal sand
Sands Desert sand
Semi-stabilized to stabilized (> 40m) dune
Semi-stabilized to stabilized moderately high ( 15- 40m) dune
Sands Riverine
Mining/industrial wastelands
Mining dumps
Industrial wasteland
Barren rocky area
Snow cover and/or glacial area

Ground data collection and verification


Ground data forms an important source of information for mapping and accuracy
estimation. The field work involved identification of statistically sound sample grids that
have been verified on the ground. On the basis of the interpretative uncertainty
highlighted during the preliminary interpretation a portion of map units have been
selected for field checking. These first sets of points have been integrated, if necessary,
by an extra set of checks to assure a good statistical representation of the land cover
classes. Fieldwork has been executed using a fully standardized methodology. The
fieldwork involved establishing the relationship between image elements and the
tentatively identified wasteland categories during preliminary interpretation.
Intermediate interpretation accuracy was done using field data. This information has
allowed to evaluate, in a rather objective way, the work done in the preliminary phase of
interpretation (See figs on ground photo).
4. Result and Discussions:
The category wise statistics of Wasteland Classes is shown in Table II :
Wasteland Category (2005-06)
Gullied/Ravine land-Medium ravine
Land with dense scrub
Land with open scrub
Waterlogged and marshy land - Permanent
Waterlogged and marshy land - Seasonal

Area Sq.km % Of Wasteland


547.03
11251.44
13242.14
59.03
1.76

0.18
3.66
4.30
0.02
0.00

41.00
26.36

0.01
0.01

Under utilised/degraded notified forest land-Scrub


dominated

10026.96

3.26

Under utilised/degraded notified forest land-Agriculture


Degraded pastures/grazing land
Degraded land under plantation crops

1189.18
149.72
21.25

0.39
0.05
0.01

Sands-Riverine
Sands-Coastal sand

3.65
29.48

0.00
0.01

Mining/industrial wastelands-Mining dumps

30.45

0.01

Land affected by salinity/alkalinity-Salt affected landModerate


Land affected by salinity/alkalinity-Salt affected land-Strong

Barren rocky area


Total
TGA

1643.77
38262.82

0.53
12.44

307690.00

Maharashtra forms part of the Deccan plateau, its western upturned rims rising to
form the Sahayadri Range parallel to the sea-coast and its slopes gently descending
towards the east and south-east. Satpura ranges cover northern part of the State, while
Ajanta and Satmala ranges run through central part of State. Arabian Sea guards the
western boundary of Maharashtra, while Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are on the
northern side. Chhattisgarh covers the eastern boundary of the State. Karnataka and
Andhra Pradesh are on its southern side.
The total geographical area of Maharashtra is 3,07,690 sq.km. out of which
38,262.82 sq. km. is under wastelands accounting for 12.44% of the geographical area
of the State. Land with open scrub is the major wasteland category covering an area of
13,242.14 sq. km. There has been a decrease in the areal extent of wastelands to the
tune of 11012.60 sq. km. in comparison with 2003 wastelands due to various reasons
like developmental programmes implemented by government agencies as well as
NGOs, refinement in the mapping due to improvement in satellite data resolution. The
district with the highest percentage of wastelands is Raigad with 29.92% while Gondia
district with 5.28%, has the least percentage of wastelands (See fig on wasteland
dynamics).
5. Looking Ahead:
Since the launch of wastelands mapping project, various Government agencies
have taken up the reclamation of wastelands particularly through the implementation of
wastelands programmes in the State by consulting these databases. The new initiative
on Wasteland Change Analysis can be taken up with the aim of reporting the changes
in wastelands in Maharashtra using IRS LISS III data of 2005-06 and 2008-09.
6. Beneficiaries:
Various government agencies like Agriculture department, Forest and Socialforestry, State universities, MIDC and NGOs.

Ground Truth Photographs:

WASTELANDS DYNAMICS

31 Jan 2003

Pimpali

19 Jan 2006

Pimpali

Stony waste area converted into agriculture area, Baramati Taluka

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