Análisis multitemporal del cambio de uso de la tierra en el Departamento de Alto Paraguay, Paraguay

Abstract

The study area focuses in Alto Paraguay Department, located in the Occidental Region of Paraguay. The overall objective of the research was to analyze in inter-annual time sections the changes of land use for the period 1992 – 2012 and estimate the trend of change of land use for the next eight decades in the Department of Alto Paraguay. The first step was to analyze the satellite images of 1992, 1997, 2002, 2007 and 2012. The variables that were chosen for this research were: land with forest covering and land used for livestock production. It was used a supervised classification with the consequent generation of the finals maps and quantification of the surfaces. Images were introduced in the Idrisi Selva software for prediction for the years 2032, 2050 and 2100. The process of data analysis leads to the conclusion that there were no changes in the landscape matrix in the period 1992 – 2012, which means that the surface with forest covering were greater than the surface using for livestock production. However, it is forecasting that by 2032 there are high probabilities of changes in the matrix. The variables that have more influence on changing land use are: (a) the transition zones distance, and (b) the distance to roads. Livestock activity reports extensive characteristics, which means that new initiatives are more probably to develop in areas surrounding the existing use of land for livestock production.