Environmental monitoring and prediction of land use and land cover spatio-temporal changes: a case study from El-Omayed Biosphere Reserve, Egypt

Environmental monitoring, using the techniques of remote sensing (RS) and geographic information systems (GIS), allows the production of time efficient, cost-effective, and reliable surveillance and tracking data. Anthropogenic activities appear to be the major trigger of environmental changes, including land use and land cover (LULC) changes, while natural causes have only a minor impact in most cases. The Omayed Biosphere Reserve (OBR) stands as one of the Egyptian protected areas most highly affected by massive unplanned human activities. Thus, the main objective of this study is to determine the spatio-temporal changes in the OBR over a 35-year period using five Landsat (5 ETM images and 8 OLI-TIRS) imageries, with the specific aim of measuring change rates, trends, and magnitudes of LULC changes between 1984 and 2019 with the topography for planning and selection of developmental strategies. The Normalised Difference Vegetation Index is used to identify the vegetation characteristics of different eco-regions and delivers useful information for the study of vegetation health and density. Normalised Difference Built-up Index can likewise be used to quote built-up areas. Unsupervised classification was used to classify LULC patterns. Six classes were recognised: water bodies, coastal sand, urban areas, cultivated land, newly reclaimed areas, and bare soil. Our results reveal that about 33.55% of OBR land cover has transformed into other forms. Cultivated land and urban regions increased by about 143.5 km² and 56.17 km² from 1984 to 2019, respectively. Meanwhile, bare soil decreased to around 209.5 km² in 2019. In conclusion, the conversion of bare soil into urban land and cultivated areas is the major change in the last 35 years in the OBR. Over the past three decades, the OBR has faced radical and imbalanced changes in its natural habitats. Therefore, monitoring and management of LULC changes are crucial for creating links between policy decisions, regulatory actions, and following LULC activities in the future, especially as many potential risks still exist in the remaining regions of the OBR.