Monitoring and assessing urban encroachment into agricultural land - A remote sensing and GIS based study of Harare, Zimbabwe

Abstract

Rapid urban expansion constitutes one of the agents of land use/land cover change. Necessary and reliable data
required to analyse and predict the present and future trend of land use/land cover change resulting from
urbanization in most developing countries are of low quality, and unreliable. This study evaluates land use/ land
cover in Harare, Zimbabwe, between 1976 and 2000, using data from Landsat satellite images. Image processing and interpretation was performed with the aid of geographic information system (GIS). Rapid conversion of land covered by forest to non- agricultural use was revealed with built-up area increase in all directions.in a leap frog manner. The study also revealed a loss of about 1.38% of farmland to urbanization between 1976 and 2000. The study shows that the dearth of data for urban management can be reversed through the use of remotely sensed data and GIS operations.

Keywords : Remote Sensing, GIS, Urban Expansion, Land Use and Land Cover.