Integrating Remote Sensing and a Markov-FLUS Model to Simulate Future Land Use Changes in Hokkaido, Japan

As the second largest island in Japan, Hokkaido provides precious land resources for the Japanese people. Meanwhile, as the food base of Japan, the gradual decrease of the agricultural population and more intensive agricultural practices on Hokkaido have led its arable land use to change year by year, which has also caused changes to the whole land use pattern of the entire island of Hokkaido. To realize the sustainable use of land resources in Hokkaido, past and future changes in land use patterns must be investigated, and target-based land use planning suggestions should be given on this basis. This study uses remote sensing and GIS technology to analyze the temporal and spatial changes of land use in Hokkaido during the past two decades. The types of land use include cultivated land, forest, waterbody, construction, grassland, and others, by using the satellite images of the Landsat images in 2000, 2010, and 2019 to achieve this goal to make classification. In addition, this study used the coupled Markov-FLUS model to simulate and analyze the land use changes in three different scenarios in Hokkaido in the next 20 years. Scenario-based situational analysis shows that the cultivated land in Hokkaido will drop by about 25% in 2040 under the natural development scenario (ND), while the cultivated land area in Hokkaido will remain basically unchanged in cultivated land protection scenario (CP). In forest protection scenario (FP), the area of forest in Hokkaido will increase by 1580.8 km2. It is believed that the findings reveal that the forest land in Hokkaido has been well protected in the past and will be protected well in the next 20 years. However, in land use planning for future, Hokkaido government and enterprises should pay more attention to the protection of cultivated land.