Geo-Environmental Problems and Its Impact on Land use and Landcover Change: A Case Study in Takimari Grazing Reserve of Goalpara District, Assam

Abstract

The geo-environmental setting and problems of an area exert considerable influence on the nature and development of cultural landscape of the area. Floods, river bank shifting, erosion and deposition, etc. are the significant natural hazards that highly influence on the changing pattern of Land use and land cover of the area concerned. The Takimari Grazing Reserve is situated in the Jaleswar Development Block in the district of Goalpara. It extends from 26⁰2^/ 44.47''N to 26⁰ 03' 42.79''N latitude and 90⁰ 16'43.25''Eto 90^o18^/ 23.4''E Longitude.  It consists of six different revenue villages, namely the Bidhypara, Pathailapara, Ratanpur, Tiapara, Jamilabari and Nathongthonga with a total area of 5.36 km² tell the year 1976. At present nearly one third of this area has been erodedby the river Brahmaputra. The present area of the Grazingreserve is only 3.05 km² and more than a half (1.75km²) of the area left after erosion is under siltation by the river Brahmaputra.

Here, an attempt has been made to analyze the changing nature of geo-environmental problems and its impact on land use and land cover change in Takimari Grazing Reserve of Goalpara District in Assam by using topographical sheet of 1968, a cadastral map showing land uses of 1976, satellite imagery of 2010  and GPS mapping in July, 2018.