Hikobia 16: 920.

2011

Changes in land use/land cover and priority determination on handling land degradation in Cirasea sub-watershed, West Java
RACHMAD FIRDAUS, NOBUKAZU NAKAGOSHI AND BENI RAHARJO
R ACHMAD FIRDAUS, NAKAGOSHI, N. & BENI R AHARJO. 2011. Changes in land use/ land cover and priority determination on handling land degradation in Cirasea subwatershed, West Java. Hikobia 16: 920. Land use/land cover (LULC) change, population pressure and land degradation are still major environmental problems in Indonesia. The existence of Cirasea sub-watershed as a planning unit is important for regional development in the upland Citarum watershed. One of the main problems in Cirasea sub-watershed is land degradation that can disturb the sustainability of conservation and cultivation functions. This paper examines LULC change, population pressure and priority determination on handling land degradation. LULC change was evaluated by comparing satellite imagesbased and LULC classification in 2003 and 2010. Land degradation was analyzed by using two methods where soil erosion was analyzed by using USLE method and population pressure was examined by using PPI method. The results of this study showed that most areas of Cirasea sub-watershed were high soil erosion, population pressure and degradated land areas. They were indicated by the high level of the annual potential soil erosion level about 86.50 ton/ha/yr in 2003 and increased to 96.8 ton/ha/ yr in 2010 and the area was dominated by the high population pressure level for about 30,332.42 ha (88.03%) in 2003 to 31,637.65 ha (91.82%) in 2010 respectively. This case study contributes for the direction of handling land degradation at watershed scales and recommended to follow the handling priorities of land degradation. Rachmad Firdaus & Nobukazu Nakagoshi, Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation (IDEC), Hiroshima University, 151 Kagamiyama, Higashihiroshima, 7398529, Japan. Beni Raharjo, Center for Borneo Environmental Studies, Banjar Baru South Kalimantan, 70713, Indonesia.

Introduction Change in LULC is increasingly recognized as an important driver of environmental change on all spatial and temporal scales (Turner & Meyer 1994) and it can be a major threat to biodiversity (Verburg et al. 1999). LULC is always dynamic when it constantly changes in response to the dynamic interaction between underlying drivers and proximate causes (Lambin et al. 2003). Globally, LULC today is altered principally by direct human use, such as agriculture and livestock raising, forest harvesting and management, and urban and suburban construction and development (Meyer 1995). Landscape changes include not

only damage by agriculture, but also degradation of historic value and land conservation functions (Ohta & Nakagoshi 2011). During the last few decades, watershed degradation has been seen as a serious threat to environmental conditions. Many of watersheds today suffer from several detrimental problems such as severe soil erosion, flood, drought, and declining land productivity or land degradation. Land degradation, a synonym for soil degradation (Kertez 2009) that its functions have damaged by climate or human activities (Maitima et al. 2009), is a critical environmental problem in many countries (Wei et al. 2010) and a widespread problem in developing countries (Ananda & Herath 2003).