Global land cover trajectories and transitions

Abstract Global land cover (LC) changes threaten sustainability and yet we lack a comprehensive understanding of the gains and losses of LC types, including the magnitudes, locations and timings of transitions. We used a novel, fine-resolution and temporally consistent satellite-derived dataset cove...

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Autores principales:	Taher M. Radwan, G. Alan Blackburn, J. Duncan Whyatt, Peter M. Atkinson
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Nature Portfolio 2021
Materias:	Medicine R Science Q
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/a0e3de3551bb430bb1bc1e6ad7f22910
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:a0e3de3551bb430bb1bc1e6ad7f229102021-12-02T17:41:27ZGlobal land cover trajectories and transitions10.1038/s41598-021-92256-22045-2322https://doaj.org/article/a0e3de3551bb430bb1bc1e6ad7f229102021-06-01T00:00:00Zhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-92256-2https://doaj.org/toc/2045-2322Abstract Global land cover (LC) changes threaten sustainability and yet we lack a comprehensive understanding of the gains and losses of LC types, including the magnitudes, locations and timings of transitions. We used a novel, fine-resolution and temporally consistent satellite-derived dataset covering the entire Earth annually from 1992 to 2018 to quantify LC changes across a range of scales. At global and continental scales, the observed trajectories of change for most LC types were fairly smooth and consistent in direction through time. We show these observed trajectories in the context of error margins produced by extrapolating previously published accuracy metrics associated with the LC dataset. For many LC classes the observed changes were found to be within the error margins. However, an important exception was the increase in urban land, which was consistently larger than the error margins, and for which the LC transition was unidirectional. An advantage of analysing the global, fine spatial resolution LC time-series dataset is the ability to identify where and when LC changes have taken place on the Earth. We present LC change maps and trajectories that identify locations with high dynamism, and which pose significant sustainability challenges. We focused on forest loss and urban growth at the national scale, identifying the top 10 countries with the largest percentages of forest loss and urban growth globally. Crucially, we found that most of these ‘worst-case’ countries have stabilized their forest losses, although urban expansion was monotonic in all cases. These findings provide crucial information to support progress towards the UN’s SDGs.Taher M. RadwanG. Alan BlackburnJ. Duncan WhyattPeter M. AtkinsonNature PortfolioarticleMedicineRScienceQENScientific Reports, Vol 11, Iss 1, Pp 1-16 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Medicine R Science Q
spellingShingle	Medicine R Science Q Taher M. Radwan G. Alan Blackburn J. Duncan Whyatt Peter M. Atkinson Global land cover trajectories and transitions
description	Abstract Global land cover (LC) changes threaten sustainability and yet we lack a comprehensive understanding of the gains and losses of LC types, including the magnitudes, locations and timings of transitions. We used a novel, fine-resolution and temporally consistent satellite-derived dataset covering the entire Earth annually from 1992 to 2018 to quantify LC changes across a range of scales. At global and continental scales, the observed trajectories of change for most LC types were fairly smooth and consistent in direction through time. We show these observed trajectories in the context of error margins produced by extrapolating previously published accuracy metrics associated with the LC dataset. For many LC classes the observed changes were found to be within the error margins. However, an important exception was the increase in urban land, which was consistently larger than the error margins, and for which the LC transition was unidirectional. An advantage of analysing the global, fine spatial resolution LC time-series dataset is the ability to identify where and when LC changes have taken place on the Earth. We present LC change maps and trajectories that identify locations with high dynamism, and which pose significant sustainability challenges. We focused on forest loss and urban growth at the national scale, identifying the top 10 countries with the largest percentages of forest loss and urban growth globally. Crucially, we found that most of these ‘worst-case’ countries have stabilized their forest losses, although urban expansion was monotonic in all cases. These findings provide crucial information to support progress towards the UN’s SDGs.
format	article
author	Taher M. Radwan G. Alan Blackburn J. Duncan Whyatt Peter M. Atkinson
author_facet	Taher M. Radwan G. Alan Blackburn J. Duncan Whyatt Peter M. Atkinson
author_sort	Taher M. Radwan
title	Global land cover trajectories and transitions
title_short	Global land cover trajectories and transitions
title_full	Global land cover trajectories and transitions
title_fullStr	Global land cover trajectories and transitions
title_full_unstemmed	Global land cover trajectories and transitions
title_sort	global land cover trajectories and transitions
publisher	Nature Portfolio
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/a0e3de3551bb430bb1bc1e6ad7f22910
work_keys_str_mv	AT tahermradwan globallandcovertrajectoriesandtransitions AT galanblackburn globallandcovertrajectoriesandtransitions AT jduncanwhyatt globallandcovertrajectoriesandtransitions AT petermatkinson globallandcovertrajectoriesandtransitions
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Global land cover trajectories and transitions

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