Assessment of soil loss to vulnerability in the Boane District in Mozambique

Abstract

The soil lost vulnerability study of the landscape units constitutes one of the mechanisms for the design of sustainable land use and cover and natural resources. Therefore, this research aimed to evaluate the soil loss vulnerability in the Boane district in 2018. The materials used included OLI Landsat 8 and ASTER GDTM V2 images, through which we generated land use and cover and slope maps respectively, soils, lithology, and precipitation databases available in CENACARTA. This data was processed in a GIS environment. The results showed that 53.3% of the district had median stability, 34.7% moderately vulnerable, 11.4% moderately stable, 0.6% stable and 0% vulnerable. These results indicate a favorable situation, but not comfortable at the short term, due to the accelerated rhythm of urbanization and its consequences to the environment that is seen in the last decades, joined to the lack or non-implementation of the main planning plans, that can change this situation in short term.

Keywords:
Boane; Stability; Geoprocessing; Soil Loss