IMPACT OF LAND USE AND LAND COVER DYNAMICS ON

SEDIMENT YIELD AND HYDROLOGICAL RESPONSE OF A

WATERSHED

BAYISA TULU AREDA

ID No. PGR/22408/13

A SEMINAR I SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF

WATER RESOURCE ENGINEERING

SCHOOL OF CIVIL ENGINEERING AND ARCHITECTURE

OFFICE OF GRADUATE STUDIES

ADAMA SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY

ADAMA

JUN/2021
Impact of Land Use and Land Cover Dynamics on Sediment Yield and
Hydrological Response of a Watershed

BAYISA TULU AREDA

Advisor(s): Mulugeta Musei (PhD)

A Seminar Review Submitted to the Department of

Water Resource Engineering

School of Civil Engineering and Architecture

Office of Graduate Studies

Adama Science and Technology University

Adama

Jun/2021
 APPROVAL SHEET

This seminar review, which is entitled as “Impact of Land Use and Land Cover Dynamics on
Sediment Yield and Hydrological Response of a Watershed” , is to be approved by the
following examiners in Water Resource Engineering in Adama Science and Technology
University.

Bayisa Tulu _________________ _________________

Student Signature Date

Mulugeta Musei (PhD) _________________ _________________

Advisor Signature Date

_________________ _________________ _________________

Department Head Signature Date

_________________ _________________ _________________

School Dean Signature Date

_________________ _________________ _________________

Postgraduate Dean Signature Date

ii
 LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

ASTER Advanced Space borne Thermal Emission and Reflection

CFSR Climate Forecast System Reanalysis

CUP Calibration and Uncertainty Program

DEM Digital Elevation Model

ERDAS Earth Resources Data Analysis System

ET Evapotranspiration

ETM+ Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus

FAO Food and Agriculture Organization

GCP Ground Control Point

GDEM Global Digital Elevation Model

GIS Geographic Information System

GWQ Groundwater Flow

HRUs Hydrologic Response Units

Km Kilo meter

LatQ Lateral Flow

LULC Land use land cover

MK Mann-Kendall

MoWIE Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Energy

MSS Multi Spectral Scanner

MUSLE Modified Universal Soil Loss Equation

N NSE Nash Sutcliffe Efficiency

MA National Meteorological Agency of Ethiopia

OLI Operational Land Imager

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PBIAS Percent Bias

PLSR Partial Least Square Regression

R2 Coefficient of Determination

RMSER Root Mean Square Error

RS Remote Sensing

S Scenario

SCS Soil Conservation Service

STRM Shuttle Radar Topography Mission

SUFI-2 Sequential Uncertainty Fitting

SurfQ Surface Runoff

SW Sub Watershed

SWAT Soil and Water Assessment Tool

t/ha tone/hector

TM Thematic Mapper

TSL Tolerable Soil Loss

USGS United States Geological Survey

USLE-K Universal Soil Loss Equation- Soil Erodibility Factor

USLE-P Universal Soil Loss Equation- Practice Support Factor

VIP Variable Importance in Projection

W Weight Value

XLSTAT Statistical Software for Excel

yr Year

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 TABLE OF CONTENT

Contents Page

LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS ................................................................ iii

TABLE OF CONTENT ..............................................................................................................v
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................... vi
1. INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................. 2
2. METHODOLOGY.............................................................................................................. 3
3. LAND USE LAND COVER CHANGE............................................................................. 7
4. IMPACT OF LAND USE LAND COVER CHANGE ON SEDIMENT YIELD AND
HYDROLOGICAL RESPONSES ............................................................................................. 9
4.1. Impact of Land Use Land Cover Change on Sediment Yield ............................................. 9
4.2 Impact of Land Use Land Cover Change on Hydrological Response .......................... 11
5. RESEARCH GAP............................................................................................................. 15
6. CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................. 17
REFERENCES......................................................................................................................... 18

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 ABSTRACT

Land use land cover (LULC) dynamics such as the change of forest area into agricultural land
and urban areas are the major problem in the world particularly in developing countries which
accelerate the rate of sediment yield, surface runoff and stream flow generally affect the
hydrologic balance of a watershed. The surface runoff, groundwater flow, lateral flow and
evapotranspiration were affected by the expansion of agriculture and urban settlement (decrease
in dry flow season and increase in wet flow season). The objective of this review was to assess
different research findings conducted in different part of the world on the LULC dynamics and
its implication regarding to the sediment yield and hydrological cycle components. From
previous papers reviewed in this paper such as “Effect of land use land cover dynamics on
hydrological response of watershed: Case study of Tekeze Dam watershed, northern Ethiopia
(Welde and Gebremariam, 2017), Effect of dynamic land use/ land cover change on water
resources and sediment yield in the Anzali wetland catchment, Gilan, Iran (Aghsaei et al.,
2020), Impacts of land use land cover change on runoff and sediment yield of Upper Tapi River
Sub-Basin, India (Munoth and Goyal, 2019), Impact of land use/land cover change on stream
flow in the Shaya catchment of Ethiopia using the MIKE SHE model (Aredo et al., 2021), The
response of water balance components to land cover change based on hydrologic modeling and
partial least squares regression (PLSR) analysis in the Upper Awash Basin (Shawul et al.,
2019)”, the sediment yield and surface runoff were increased in wet season and decreased in
dry season due to the expansion of agriculture at the expense of forest land, bush land and
rangeland. In some studies like the study by Aghsaei et al., 2020, the evapotranspiration were
decreased in wet season and increased in dry season due to the expanded agriculture in dry
season. Future research works should pay attention for the effect of LULC and climate
variability on current and future hydrologic condition of a watershed using various physical
based and data driven hydrological models.

Keywords: LULC, Stream flow, Sediment yield, SWAT, MIKE-SHE, PLSR

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 1. INTRODUCTION

Land use land cover (LULC) is the vital elements of the world ecosystem which affects numerous
major natural processes such as water cycle, geomorphological processes, land productivity and
animal species (Githui et al., 2010, Cai et al., 2012). Catchments are sensitive to land use land
cover dynamics induced by human activities (Bosch and Hewlett, 1982). Land use land cover of a
given region or environment is subject to certain changes. It has a significant impact on catchment
hydrology, and these impacts can be interrelated (Kibria et al.,2016).The change in LULC classes
for example reduction in forest cover, increase in settlement areas, intensive cultivation and
overgrazing consequently affects the overall hydrological responses of the catchment (Abbas et
al., 2015). So LULC is a crucial factor that influences the hydrological responses of a river system
along with the climate variables (Neupene and Kumar, 2015; Zhang et al., 2017). Generally the
current global trends such as population and economic growth which lead to increased food and
fuel demands, exert increasing pressure on land and water resources worldwide (Grey et
al.,2014;Biswas et al.,2002). Therefore the quantity, intensity and velocity of runoff increased due
to continuous increase in deforestation, settlement areas, intensive cultivation of annual agriculture
crops on steep slopes coupled with poor conservation practices and other anthropogenic practices
(Abbas et al., 2015). In Africa, Asia and South America; where the majority of population is
dependent on agriculture, soil erosion is a serious challenge for food production. Countries like
Ethiopia, suffer from severe soil erosion (Awulachew et al., 2008). FAO (1986) had reported 100
t/ha/yr in the Ethiopian highlands. The worldwide annual river discharge has increased
significantly since 1900, and research suggests that LULC change may be directly responsible for
more than 50% of this increase (Kumar et al., 2017).

Hydrologic response to LULC changes and land management practices are the integrated
indicators of the watershed conditions. A holistic understanding of the complex and dynamic land
surface and its interacting parts is required to make precise prediction of the future water balance
(Feyen and Raul, 2011). Knowledge of the distribution and types of LULC are essential for
resources base analysis on land degradation, land productivity and its impacts on water resources
(Solomon, 1994; Bewket, 2002; Amsalu et al., 2007). General statements about land-water
interactions need to be continuously questioned to determine whether they represent the best
available information and the available information supports decision making processes for
developmental activities in sustainable way (FAO, 2002). Hence, comprehensive and improved
procedures that integrate different techniques such as remote sensing, hydrologic modelling and
statistical approaches are necessary to identify the influence of LULC change and land
management practices on the hydrological variability of a river basin.

The several studies (Welde and Gebremariam, 2017; Munoth and Goyal, 2019; Shawul et al.,
2019; Aghsaei et al., 2020; Aredo et al., 2021) have quantified the impact of LULC dynamics on
sediment yield and hydrologic processes at watershed level through the hydrologic modelling
integrated with Geographic information System (GIS) and Remote Sensing (RS) techniques. The
research by Welde and Gebremariam, 2017; Munoth and Goyal, 2019; Shawul et al., 2019;
Aghsaei et al., 2020; Aredo et al., 2021 were investigated the impact of LULC dynamics on
watershed hydrological processes using ARC SWAT, QSWAT, MIKE-SHE hydrological models
applied in ARCGIS, QGIS and RS techniques and Partial least square regression model method.

The main objective of this review was intended to assess different research findings done in
different parts of World on the LULC dynamic pattern and its implication regarding hydrological
cycle and sediment yield.

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 2. METHODOLOGY

Several research works were undertaken on the spatial and temporal LULC change at watershed
level in various parts of the world. A study by Welde and Gebremariam (2017) on Tekeze dam
watershed (29,404 km^2) which is a part of Tekeze River in northern west, Ethiopia by using
SWAT model and Arc GIS 9.3 as an interface. A long term records (1978-2013) of meteorological
data, Stream flow data records (1978-2006), DEM downloaded from ASTER.GDEM website with
30m resolution, LULC data of 1986 and 2008 LULC from ministry of water resources and ministry
of agriculture of Ethiopia and a digitized soil map of Tekeze dam watershed obtained from ministry
of Agriculture of Ethiopia used as an input in ARC SWAT model. They reported that the
agriculture, shrub land and grasslands were the dominant LULC types of the study area for the
period between 1986 and 2008. According to the research reported by Welde and Gebremariam
(2017), A SWAT model achieved a relatively good fit between the measured and simulated value
for both the calibration and validation periods for both LULC of 1986 and 2008. The Statistical
parameter such as correlation coefficient (R2), Nash-Sutcliffe simulation efficiency (ENS) and
percent of bias (PBIAS) were ensured that the SWAT model provides a confidence for further
application of the model to assess stream flow and sediment yield of the study area.

Aghsaei et al. (2020) carried out a research study on the effects of dynamic LULC on water
resources and sediment yield in the Anzali wetland catchment, Gilan, Iran by using LULC of 1990,
2000 and 2013 LULC that downloaded from satellite data. Arc GIS and ERDAS Imagine were
used to process the satellite data and to assess the LULC change in the study area. They classified
the wet land catchment into six major LULC classes namely forest, agriculture, grassland, water
and urban areas. A GIS interface Arc SWAT-2012 was used to set up a SWAT model of the Anzali
wetland catchment according the result reported by Aghsaei et al. (2020). The monthly stream
flow data was used as input in SWAT since daily stream flow was not available for the catchment
which is one of the drawback of this article. They were used SCS curve number approach (SCS,
1972) and Penman-Monteith equation (Allen et al., 1989) to calculate the surface runoff and
potential evapotranspiration, respectively. The Anzali wetland catchment was divided into 30/34
sub-basins and 822/1004 Hydrologic response units (HRUs) for northern and southern catchment,
respectively. They studied the hydrological impacts of LULC change in the study area by two

3
different model namely a static model using 1990 LULC and a dynamic model using 1990 and
2013 LULC. The modified universal soil loss equation (MUSLE) was used to estimate sediment
yield in SWAT model. The SWAT model performance for Anzali wetland catchment was
evaluated using percent bias (PBIAS) and Nash-Sutcliffe coefficient of efficiency (NSE).

On other hand the study was carried out by Munoth and Goyal (2019), on upper Tapi River sub-
basin, India on the impact of LULC change on runoff and sediment yield. The QSWAT model
with QGIS platform were used for assessing the impacts of LULC changes in the study area.

The daily rainfall data (from Indian meteorological department), temperature, relative humidity,
solar radiation and wind speed data (from CFSR) that collected from 1979 to 2013 were used as
input in QSWAT model. The hydrological data such as discharge (1979-2013) and sediment
concentration data (1981-2013) from Indian water portal, the DEM of 90m resolution, soil map
were downloaded from USGS and FAO websites, land use maps of 1975, 1990, 2000 and 2016
downloaded from LANDSAT MSS, TM, ETM+ and OLI respectively were used as input in
QSWAT model for the study area. The study area was divided into agriculture, barren land, built
up, forest, rangeland and water. The accuracy of the classified LULC maps was assessed using
100 randomly generated ground control points and Google earth. Munoth and Goyal (2019) were
developed four QSWAT model to identify the optimum values of parameters for the land use maps.
The models were Model1, M1 (LULC of 1975 and climate data of 1979-1982), Model2, M2
(LULC of 1990 and climate data of 1983-1995), Model3, M3 (LULC of 2000 and climate data of
1996-2007) and Model4, M4 (LULC of 2016 and climate data of 2008-2013). The models of the
study area were calibrated and validated using SWAT-CUP of SUFI-2. For all four QSWAT
models, M1, M2, M3 and M4, the R^2, ENS and PBIAS performance values were within the
allowable range and the QSWAT model was approved to be applicable for the upper Tapi River
sub-basin.

Similarly Aredo et al. (2021) were conducted a research on the impact of LULC change on stream
flow in the Shaya catchment of Genale-Dawa River basin of the Weyib River sub-basin in south
eastern part of Ethiopia using the MIKE-SHE model. The soil data were collected from ministry
of water, irrigation and electricity of Ethiopia (MWIE). The stream flow data of 30 years (1986-
2015) was collected from MWIE from gauging station near Bale Robe town. The meteorological
data of Bale Robe, Goba, Rira and Dinsho stations were collected and the DEM was downloaded

4
from Advanced Space Borne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) web portal
with 30m spatial resolution. The LULC data were obtained from the USGS website for the year of
1987, 2000, and 2015. The land use classification of Shaya catchment were classified using
ERDAS Imagine 2014 integrated with the Google earth software according to Aredo et al. (2021)
in a supervised classification method. Aredo et al. (2021) revealed that three distinct LULC data
were used for three separate period in the Shaya catchment. The 1987 LULC data was considered
to represent the period of 1986-1995, the LULC of 2000 assumed to represent the period of 1996-
2005 and the 2015 LULC was considered to represent the period of 2006-2015. They tested the
MIKE-SHE performance using the Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE), correlation coefficient (R)
and root mean square error (RMSE). They used Pettit test to conduct shift analysis to identify a
change in a statistical properties using the XLSTAT 2016 trial version software package. The trend
in climate data of the study area was carried out using the mann-kendall (MK) test which is a rank
based, non-parametric test that used for the detection of trends.

Shawul et al. (2019) conducted a study on the response of water balance components to land cover
changes using the integrated approaches of hydrologic modelling using SWAT model and PLSR
analysis to evaluate the relative impact of LULC changes on hydrologic components of Upper
Awash Basin. The daily weather data was collected from national meteorological agency of
Ethiopia (NMA). The hydrologic data were collected from the MoWIE, the soil data obtained from
soil database and digital soil map from the MoWIE, harmonized world soil database, major soil of
the world (FAO, 2002). The DEM of 30m spatial resolution was used which was obtained from
shuttle radar topography mission (STRM) and the LULC data was developed from Landsat images
which was obtained from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) earth explorer website.
Shawul et al. (2019) reported that they were used the ERDAS Imagine to classify the land cover
image and the supervised classification method using the maximum likelihood classification
technique. The Arc GIS was applied to classify the land cover into six classes such as agriculture,
dense forest, shrub land, pasture, urban and water body. The SWAT-CUP SUFI-2 was used to
analysis the sensitivity and calibration of the model for the study area. The R^2, NSE, PBIAS and
RSR were used to undertake the evaluation of model performance during calibration and
validation. The PLSR method was used to determine the relationship between the predictor (LC
changes) and the response variable (water components) where used in the study area to show the
magnitude and direction of influence. The variable importance in projection (VIP) was used to

5
identify the significant LC classes which affected the water balance components in the study area
using XLSTAT software, Excel add-ins statistical tools.

6
 3. LAND USE LAND COVER CHANGE

A study conducted by Welde and Gebremariam (2017) revealed that the bare land, cultivated land,
natural forest, plantation, water bodies and wood land were increased by 0.9%, 8.51%, 1.17%,
0.26%, 0.64% and 1.46%, respectively between 1986 and 2008. Whereas grass land and shrub
land were decreased by -3.33% and -5.62%, respectively between 1986 and 2008. Similarly
Aghsaei et al. (2020) reported that the upper part of the Anazil wetland catchment was classified
as forest (45.8%), agricultural land (40.8%), grass land cover (8%), wetland (2.5%), water (1.4%)
and urban area (1.5%) of the catchment in 1990. The significant land use land cover change was
observed in the agriculture and forest land use classes. The agricultural land use increased by 7%
(10km^2/year) between the period of 1990 to 2013. 76% (177.8km^2), 12.5% (29.3km^2) and
11.4% (26.7km^2) of land converted to agricultural land from forest, grassland and wetland,
respectively between 1990 and 2013. The forest, grassland and wetland had declined by -6.8%
(227.4km^2), -1.0% (33.4km^2) and -0.7% (23.4km^2), respectively. 91% of lost forest was
converted to the agricultural land and the remaining 9% was converted to the grass land according
to Aghsaei et al. (2020), and the lost wetland was completely converted to the agricultural land
while the water bodies in the catchment remain constant. Urban area was the most (100%) changed
among all the LULC classes in 2013 compared with 1990. The study revealed that the increment
of urban area was the expense of agricultural area (93.1%) and mainly occurred around the cities
of Soesara, Rasht and Fuman due to significant population growth in the years between 1990 and
2013 by 38%, 25% and 11%, respectively (Akbari et al., 2015).

On the other hand Munoth and Goyal (2019) reported that LULC of 1975 was covered by forest
(46.49%), rangeland (40.67%), agriculture (7.54%), and barren land (6.92%), water bodies
(0.65%) and built up (0.03%). The agricultural land had been expanding at faster rate of about
17.50% at the expense of forest and range land which decreased by 7.13% and 10.74%,
respectively, between the period of 1975 and 2016.

The result of accuracy assessment by Aredo et al. (2021) showed that six major classes of LULC
of the Shaya catchment were settlement, rangeland, forest, bush land, bare land and agricultural
area. The 1987 LULC of the study area was broadly classified as 113.1 Km^2 (24.72%), 97.9km^2
(21.39%), 87.6km^2 (19.4%), 82.5km^2 (18.03%), 60.0km^2 (15.08%) and 7.5km^2 (1.64%)

7
were covered by forest, bare land, bush land, rangeland, settlement and agriculture, respectively.
The settlement and agricultural land were increased by 4.04% and 19.23% from 1987 to 2000 and
2.32% and 4.37% from 2000 to 2015, respectively. The rate of agricultural expansion were more
significant in 1980s and 1990s compared to 2000s.

According to the study by Shawul et al. (2019), the land use change from 1974 to 2014 revealed
that the major LULC classes were cropland, shrub land and forest areas. There were a continuous
increment of cropland and urban area in the Upper Awash Basin. The cropland expanded from
49.0% to 72.1% from 1974 to 2014 and the urban area escalation was expected particularly in
Akaki sub basin due to the expansion of Addis Ababa and surrounding towns because of the higher
population growth and the rapid socio economic development. Shawul et al. (2019) found that the
urban area was increased by 606.2%. The forest and shrub land were decreased from 7.1% in 1974
to 5.35% in 2014 and from 19.6% in 1974 to 2.5% in 2014, respectively.

8
 4. IMPACT OF LAND USE LAND COVER CHANGE ON SEDIMENT
YIELD AND HYDROLOGICAL RESPONSES

4.1. Impact of Land Use Land Cover Change on Sediment Yield

Welde and Gebremariam (2017) were established three scenarios to analyze the effect of LULC
dynamics of the Tekeze dam watershed on sediment yield and stream flow. The scenarios were
climate of 2000s and LULC of 2008 (Base line), climate of 2000s and LULC of 1986 (Land use
change) and climate of 1980s and LULC of 1986 (Land use and climate and other factors change).
The climate data set were separated into two periods, 1980s (1978-1989) and 2000s (1996-2009).
Welde and Gebremariam (2017) reported that the sediment yield was more influenced than stream
flow due to the LULC dynamics of Tekeze dam watershed. Using SWAT 2009 over 22 years
(1986-2008 LULC), study indicated that the sediment yield of the study area was increased by
17.39% due to the expansion of agricultural lands and expansion of bare land. The increment of
sediment yield by 21.8% on other hand was due to the combined effect of LULC and climate
variability of dynamic rainfall events during wet season. The seasonal variation of the sediment
outflow for both land use land cover reference years (1986 LULC and 2008LULC) using 2000s
climate data, the peak sediment yield season (August to September) at the season when stream
flow was maximized. The maximum monthly sediment yield difference between 1986 and 2008
LULC occurred at months of September and august as 1.18t/ha and 1.17t/ha, respectively.

The report by Aghsaei et al. (2020) revealed that higher values of USLE-P and USLE-K were
assigned for downstream stations (G1, G7, G9, G10) since there was a high soil loss in the
agricultural areas. LAT-SED values had been increased at all stations which indicated that the
sediment concentration in lateral flow and ground water flow contributed to the total sediment
yield of the catchment due to the high amount of return flow. The results of the model run with
static and dynamic land use were used to analyze the Spatio temporal effects of dynamic LULC
change. The difference between the two applied (static and dynamic) models that provided the
isolated impact of LULC change. The total loading was increased by 2.6% (3t/km^2) through
dynamic LULC model. The impact of dynamic LULC change on mean annual sediment yield at

9
sub basin level was ranging from -9.43% (-6t/km^2/yr) in sub basin 23 to an increment of 169.4%
(76t/km^2/yr) in sub basin 41.

According to Aghsaei et al. (2020), the main factor of higher sedimentation rates was the increment
of water yield because of the conversion of forest land into the agricultural, while the urban
expansion were the cause for the decreased sediment yield due to the decrement of water yield in
sub basin 23 and 8. The expansion of urban in sub basin 23 and 8 by 36.5% and 13% caused for
the decrement of sediment yields by -9.43% and -9.1%, respectively. The sub basin 8 showed that
conversion from agriculture to urban with an increment from 65% to 78% whereas in sub basin 16
conversion from forest to agriculture with the expansion rate from 52% to 77%. In sub basin 16,
the largest variation in sediment yield was observed in October 2013 (2.8 t/km^2) due to the
increased amount of water yield in irrigated months. These showed that the positive correlation
between water and sediment yield. Sub basin 8 experienced the most substantial decrement of
sediment yield with -7t/km^2 in September 2011 due to decrement of water yield by -5.2mm and
urban expansion.

Similar study conducted by Munoth and Goyal (2019) indicated that the study area was divided
into 9 sub basins. Four scenarios were developed by keeping other input data constant and LULC
maps were changed to study the impact on sediment yield and hydrological processes of the Tapi
river sub basin in India. The four scenarios were scenario1 (LU of 1975 and climate data of 1979-
2013), S1, scenario2 (LU of 1990 and climate data of 1979-2013), S2, scenario3 (LU of 2000 and
climate data of 1979-2013), S3, scenario4 (LU of 2016 and climate data of 1979-2013), S4. The
impact of LULC changes showed that the surface runoff, sediment yield and water yields were
increased from S1 to S4 due to the increased agricultural land and reduction of forest coverage and
range land on the study area. The sediment yield was increased by 4.74t/ha (21.48%) from S1 to
S4. According to the study reported by Munoth and Goyal (2019) the sub watershed SW1, SW3,
SW4 and SW6 were generated a minimum sediment yield due to the part of these sub watershed
were covered with forest area. SW5, SW8 and SW9 sub watershed sediment yields were increased
due to the agricultural expansion. The overall sediment yield were increased in agricultural and
forest class due to the change in CN2 values. For agricultural class the sediment yield increased
from 18.29t/ha in S1 to 60t/ha for S4. Barren land was producing the highest sediment yield in the

10
sub basin. The sediment yield in forest land class was 0.64t/ha for S1 and increased to 0.72, 0.79
and 0.81t/ha for S2, S3 and S4, respectively.

On the other hand Shawul et al. (2019) found that the increment of cropland at the expense of
grassland increased the water yield which might lead to more sediment yield in the watershed of
Upper Awash River Basin.

4.2 Impact of Land Use Land Cover Change on Hydrological Response

The study on Tekeze dam watershed by Welde and Gebremariam (2017) revealed that the mean
annual flow was increased by 6.20% due to the expansion of agricultural lands and bare lands and
these made the watershed susceptible to surface runoff. A 7.31% of stream flow increment was
observed due to the combined effect of land use change and climate variability. According to the
study, the land use dynamics had a higher effect during the peak stream flow season (August) and
the medium flow months (September –November) and lower effect during dry season. The stream
flow was increased up to 28.67% in September under the same climatic condition when compare
2008 LULC with 1986 LULC.

Aghsaei et al. (2020) indicated that the difference between the two applied model (static and
dynamic) that provided that the isolated impact of land use change. The average annual values for
water balance components were smaller than 100mm on the catchment scale. The ET, Water yields
and Surface runoff for the dynamic model increased by 0.9%, 1% and 2.8%, respectively, due to
the conversion of forest to the irrigated paddy field, the ET was increased. The study by Aghsaei
et al. (2020) showed that the long term mean annual ET ranges from a decrease of -2.4mm/yr (-
3.5%) in sub basin 23 to an increase of 54.9mm/yr (8.3%) in sub basin 6. There were a decrease
in ET in eastern part of the Anzali wetland catchment, because of the major land use was from
agriculture to urban. The long term average water yield range from a decrease of -15.2mm/yr (-
2.3%) in sub basin 23 to an increase of 56.7mm/yr (6.9%) in sub basin 41 due to highest
agricultural expansion (31.3%). A -2.3% and -1% reduction of water yield from base flow in sub
basin 23 and 8, respectively, due to expansion of built up area that resulted an increased surface
runoff and decreased infiltration. Aghsaei et al. (2020) also assessed the impact of LULC at
seasonal time scale. They were selected sub basin 8 and 16 as representative of the two main LULC

11
transitions in the catchment i.e. from agriculture to urban (sub basin 8) and from forest to
agriculture (sub basin 16).

In sub basin 16, ET increased by 17.2mm in dry season (April to August) and decreased by -2.7mm
in wet season (September to February). The water yield also increased by 17.6mm in July 2012
due to expanded agriculture in dry season due to water withdrawal for irrigation activities. In sub
basin 8, ET decreased during dry season months with the maximum decrease in July and August
due to the decreased irrigated agriculture. So the study conducted by Aghsaei et al. (2020)
indicated that the ET increased only during the dry season by agricultural land use due to increased
consumption of irrigation water. The water yield slightly increased in rainy seasons (1.06mm
maximum in March 2012) while it decreased in dry season even though the surface runoff was
slightly increased. The water yield difference in July 2012 reached -6.63mm due to decrease in
groundwater flow because of increased impervious surface due to urban expansion.

Similar study conducted by Munoth and Goyal (2019) on the Tapi River sub basin in India revealed
that the surface runoff has increased in all 9 sub watershed from S1 to S4 Scenario. The water
yield also increased for all sub watershed from S1 to S4 scenario. The SW1, SW3, SW4, SW6,
SW7 and SW8 had a high water yields while SW2, SW5 and SW9 had lower water yields. The
water yields gradually increased by 83, 92, 93, 104, 79 and 89mm for SW1, SW2, SW3, SW4,
SW5 and Sw6 from S1 to S4 scenario, respectively. According to the results conducted by Munoth
and Goyal (2019), the overall surface runoff were increasing in agricultural and forest due to the
change of CN2 values. For agricultural class the surface runoff were increased from 263.72mm in
scenario S1 to 497mm in scenario S4. For forest land class, there were an increase of 100mm
surface runoff from scenario S1 to S4.

Another study by Aredo et al. (2021) showed that the LULC changes had an impact on stream
flow that there was an increase by 23.25% and 20.69% considering 1987 and 2015 LULC
conditions. The stream flow was increased in the wet season (July, August and September) and
decreased in dry season (January, February and March). The mean monthly stream flow was
increased by 10.01%, 9.81% and 19.82% in wet season while it was decreased in dry season by -
4.91%, -2.16% and -7.06% for the period between 1987and 2000, 2000 and 2015 and 1987 and
2015, respectively. The expansion of agriculture and settlement area might have attributed to the
high amount of stream flow in the study catchment (Aredo et al., 2021).

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The quantitative analysis showed that the impact extent of using the XLSTAT 2016 software
package, there was no shift observed in the rainfall and stream flow data. The trend analysis of
stream flow records using MK test resulted that there was no significant increase or decrease in
rainfall during the study period. In dry season, the rainfall was lost as infiltrated water that
satisfying the initial abstraction of the study catchment. In the catchment the rainfall in dry season
was so intermittent and these made the reduced runoff and stream flow compared to 1980s.

The study conducted by Shawul et al. (2019) on Upper Awash Basin showed that the impact of
LULC on surface runoff (SurfQ), lateral flow (latQ), groundwater flow (GWQ) and actual
evapotranspiration (ET) were analyzed. There were higher fluctuation in SurfQ and latQ
compared to GWQ and ET values. The LULC of 2014 had higher SurfQ, latQ and GWQ than the
earlier historical data due to the expansion of cropland and urban areas. The annual SurfQ was
increased by 9.06% between LULC of 1974 and 1984, a reduction of latQ by 16.3%, a reduction
of GWQ by 0.1% and 0.98% reduction of ET between LULC of 1974 and 1984. The expansion of
cropland at the expense of forest and shrub land resulted the increment of surfQ and reduction of
ET. There were an improvement in forest coverage in years of 2000 to 2014 LULC from 3.2% to
5.3% and an increment of pasture area from 0.9% in 2000 to 2.9% in 2014 due to afforestation and
agro forestry practice. A 4 decade LULC analysis showed that an increment of surfQ by 18.4%
whereas latQ, GWQ and ET were decreased by -24%, -2.1% and -0.1%, respectively in the study
area. More than 52% of surfQ was occurred during the summer season, 19% of surfQ and 7.7% of
surfQ were occurred in spring and dry season, respectively in upper Awash Basin. There were
higher variation in surfQ and GWQ in Akaki, Mojo, Melka Kuntre and Hombole sub basin for
LULC of 1974 to 2014. Akaki sub basin was experienced a larger increment in surfQ of 83mm
(75%), reduction of GWQ by 9.6% due to higher urban growth because of the expansion of Addis
Ababa city and reduction of pasture and shrub land. Due to the change of shrub land, forest and
pasture land to the cropland between the years of 1974 to 2014, higher fluctuation of surfQ and
GWQ were observed in Mojo, Melka Kuntre and Hombole sub basins.

According to the Shawul et al. (2019), the basin wide average change in hydrological process due
to LULC change indicated that the CN as 1.86%, surfQ as 6.31%, GWQ as -3.62% and ET as -
0.46% between the years of 1974 and 1984 LULC. For the LULC between the years of 2000 and
2014, the CN, surfQ, GWQ and ET was 2.53%, 8.99%, -2.59% and -1.72%, respectively.

13
Shawul et al. (2019) also conducted a study in Upper Awash Basin on the impact of LULC on
water balance components using Partial Least Square Regression (PLSR) model revealed that
annual surfQ was highly attributed to change in the area of cropland and urban area with the
correlation coefficient (CC) of 0.94 and 0.90, respectively. Whereas the latQ and GWQ was
indirectly related to the change in the cropland and urban area with negative CC values. The ET
was more in forest and shrub land area and least effect with lower CC values. The surfQ was
negatively correlated with forest, shrub land and pasture while the GWQ had a positive correlation
with forest, shrub land and pasture land.

Shawul et al. (2019) found that the result of PLSR model for surfQ, latQ and GWQ was 97.7%,
94.3% and 90.7% for the first PLSR components for cumulative explained variance for correlation
between the explanatory variable (x) and dependent variable (y). The cumulative explained
variance for the second component of all y variables was higher than 98%.

The mono plot exhibited that the change in cropland directly influenced the surfQ and inversely
correlated to the GWQ and latQ. The forest was strongly correlated with GWQ and the pasture
and shrub land were highly correlated with latQ. Whereas ET was less affected by the LULC
changes on annual basis in Upper Awash Basin. However ET was highly affected at sub basin
level than basin wide level. The Variable Importance for the Projection (VIP) of each explanatory
variable for two components, allowed for identifying the explanatory variables that contribute the
most to the models. Values of VIP >1 and/or VIP> 0.8 based on wold’s criteria indicate that the
predictor variable was considered to be significantly important to the corresponding coefficients
in the model. The squares of w values more than 0.2 (w^2 >0.2) indicated that the PLSR
components was mainly weighted on the corresponding variables.

The VIP of 1.21, 1.15, 1.15 and 0.87 was obtained for surfQ by cropland, pasture land, urban land
and shrub land, respectively. The w values of -0.47, 0.49 and 0.47 were obtained for surfQ by
pasture land, cropland and urban area, respectively. The VIP of 1.3, 1.23, 1.07 and w values of -
0.53, 0.5 and -0.44 was obtained for latQ by cropland, pasture and urban, respectively. For GWQ
was the VIP values of 1.34, 1.04 and w values of -0.55 and -0.47 by urban area and forest area,
respectively. However the results of PLSR revealed that there was unclear relationship between
LULC changes and ET.

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 5. RESEARCH GAP

Various studies in the impact of land use land cover dynamics on sediment yield and hydrological
responses are carried out in different parts of the world. Most study’s findings shows that the land
use land cover dynamics have significant impact on sediment loading and other hydrological
components. The uncontrolled expansion of agriculture and urban area land use are the major cause
for the fluctuation in sediment yield, surface runoff, groundwater flow, lateral flow,
evapotranspiration and other hydrological process components. From five studies I reviewed,
“Effect of land use land cover dynamics on hydrological response of watershed: Case study of
Tekeze Dam watershed, northern Ethiopia (Welde and Gebremariam, 2017), Effect of dynamic
land use/ land cover change on water resources and sediment yield in the Anzali wetland
catchment, Gilan, Iran (Aghsaei et al., 2020), Impacts of land use land cover change on runoff and
sediment yield of Upper Tapi River Sub-Basin, India (Munoth and Goyal, 2019), Impact of land
use/land cover change on stream flow in the Shaya catchment of Ethiopia using the MIKE SHE
model (Aredo et al., 2021), The response of water balance components to land cover change based
on hydrologic modeling and partial least squares regression (PLSR) analysis in the Upper Awash
Basin (Shawul et al., 2019)” all except the study by Aredo et al., 2021 are not check the impact
of climate on sediment yield and hydrological responses of a watershed. In addition to the land use
dynamics, the climate variability may have an impact on hydrological processes but the studies I
reviewed didn’t quantify the climate impact. The studies listed above did not apply and check the
performance of different hydrological models for their specific watershed. They were choose and
use only one specific hydrological model without comparing the performance of various models
using statistical parameters that may fit to the specific watershed. These may reduce the accuracy,
precision and acceptance of the findings from the studies. The result of the studies on the impact
of land use land cover dynamics on sediment yield and hydrological responses do not have similar
findings. It may be due to the error occurred during the LULC classification from the satellite
image. For instance, the study in Anzali wetland catchment by Aghsaei et al., 2020, there were
misclassification of urban area in 1990 and agriculture in 2013 changes from agriculture and
grassland to forest may be due to the misclassification of LULC since no reforestation activities in
the Anzali wetland catchment. They do not suggest the future scenario for hydrological response
of the watershed to the LULC dynamics. The main factor of hydrological process component
15
fluctuation and the best management practice are not clearly stated. No one study article suggest
best management practice for watershed management of their study area. More research works on
both the impact of LULC and climate variability on hydrological process of a given catchment and
their future implication with multiple hydrological model is recommended in order to give
direction for policy and decision makers, academician and other stakeholders.

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 6. CONCLUSION

The world ecosystem and natural makeup are rapidly altered due to human induced factors such
as large scale deforestation of forest land for the purpose of agriculture and settlement. The
conversion of the forest land, shrub land and range land to the agricultural land and urban area
contributed to the rapid increment of sediment yield and surface runoff. The objective of this work
was to review different papers done on the impacts of land use land cover dynamics on sediment
yield and hydrological responses. Even though the degree of conversion of forest land to the
agricultural and settlement were different in the research articles reviewed above, they agreed that
large area of land were changed to cultivated land and settlement land from forest, shrub land and
range lands due to rapid population growth through different part of the world particularly in
developing countries. So the land use land cover dynamics in different part of the globe affects
humans and other ecological resources such as water and soils. From the five research works
reviewed in this paper, the agricultural expansion at the expense of other land cover (forest, shrub
land and range land) has significantly increased the sediment yield, surface runoff, wet month flow
and water yield. But the conversion has reduced the dry month flow, groundwater flow and
evapotranspiration in a watershed.

From the review, it was clear that the past research as reviewed in this paper was used only one
physical based hydrological model without comparing the performance of the model with other
similar application hydrological model. This may reduce the reliability of the previous works on
the impact of LULC dynamics on hydrologic processes. They did not show future impact of LULC
dynamics and their best management practices. Hence the research works should focus on the
prediction of future sediment loading and hydrological imbalance due to the LULC dynamics.

17
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