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Modeling of tropical forest conversion to oil palm expansion using area production model: A case study of Nyuatan Watershed, Indonesia

Hidayah, Hamzah (2012) Modeling of tropical forest conversion to oil palm expansion using area production model: A case study of Nyuatan Watershed, Indonesia.

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Abstract:The development of oil palm plantation in Indonesia, particularly in Kalimantan, has been increasing dramatically and the areas assigned for oil palm plantations had increased by 900,000 hectares in the past 13 years. Modeling has been used frequently to determine where forest conversion occurs and; when and how much forest is being converted. The Area Production Model (APM) is one of the predictive models focusing on modelling forest conversion due to agriculture expansion. In this study the conversion of tropical forest conversion into agriculture land in which oil palm plantations are integrated is simulated for the Nyuatan watershed. The oil palm plantation has a concession area of more than 18,000 ha, which was established in 2010 and in 2011 was in the stage of growing oil palm seedling. Based on the analysis of the land use maps periods of 2000, 2005 and 2009, the total amount of forest decreased with 17,416 ha leading to a deforestation rate of 1.23% per year. With the current trend and the establishment of oil palm plantation, the forest conversion in this area may still continue. The APM was used to simulate conversions for the period of 2000 – 2009 and the modeling outcome was compared with land use change map of 2000 – 2009. This validation resulted in a numerical accuracy of 86% and spatial accuracy of 65%. However, there is an overestimation in the prediction of location of deforested area. The overestimation by the model was influenced by factor maps which are access related maps such as slope, distance to roads, settlement and rivers. Furthermore, there are locations of observed deforestation not being predicted by APM simulation due to the forest conversion areas may be influenced by mining activities and activities from outside of the study area. The scenarios developed are business as usual, moderate and sustainable scenarios. The scenarios used growth factors which follow the trend of population growth, GDP growth and agriculture trend on province level. Furthermore, the establishment of oil palm plantation in the study area will also influence the growth factors. The business as usual scenario assumed that the economy growth increase and the practices of agriculture expansion to forest are continuing. The moderate scenario assumed that the agriculture expansion was set to forest and scrub. While sustainable scenario aimed at prioritizing the expansion of agriculture to degraded land. The simulation by APM predicted that in 50 years the forest will decrease 129,524 hectares when trend that the forest is being converted to agriculture land continues. While the forest can be reduced by 78,536 ha if the agriculture land agriculture land was being prioritized to scrub. The oil palm plantation is situated in an area that consists of 58% forest and 41% scrub. The results of APM simulations show that the prediction of forest conversion in 2040 for scenario moderate 78% is within the concession area. While for the business as usual scenario the prediction is 74% within the concession area and sustainable scenario 62% is within the concession area. Keywords: area production model, spatial model, oil palm, agriculture expansion, East Kalimantan
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:ITC: Faculty of Geo-information Science and Earth Observation
Programme:Geoinformation Science and Earth Observation MSc (75014)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/93662
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