Urban encroachment is one of the top challenges facing developing countries due to the expansion of unplanned constructions. It is associated with increment in basic services including water, electricity and sewage. Nowadays in Egypt, lack of monitoring and governmental control on new constructions causes environmental problems, threatens the current infrastructure and may lead to problems in food security. Remote sensing and GIS are effective tools to map and analyse urban encroachment using Landsat images which provide needed data for measuring the change in urban area during the period of study. The aim of this study is to estimate the changes in agricultural area due to urban encroachment in Kafr El-sheikh Governorate, Egypt by using remotely sensed Landsat multispectral images for the period between the years 2010 to 2016. Software (ERDAS IMAGINE 2014 and ArcGIS 10.3) has been used for processing and analysing remote sensing data. Results concerning the agriculture land revealed that two main issues were developed during this period. First, a loss of 77.2 km² (about 3.1% of total fertilized land in Kafr El-sheikh Governorate) is due to urban encroachment from illegal construction of settlements and fish farms. Second, an increase of more than 20 km² is due to land reclamation in non-developing areas, around the northern part of Lake Burullus and eastern part of the study area. Agriculture and fishing sectors, which present the first and largest economic sectors in the study area need to get more attention from the Government because these are most influenced and damaged sectors by urban encroachment. Our study recommends conducting further studies investigating the urban encroachment for the whole region using remote sensing data and GIS tool. Furthermore, in order to prevent the illegal constructions, the application of law in Egypt has to be enhanced and the essential services has to be provided for the increase in the development of rural areas.
Keywords: Land cover change; urban encroachment; remote sensing; GIS
Corresponding author: E-mail: m.zaky@alexu.edu.eg
Mohamed*, M. Z. ., & Yacout, D. M. M. . (2019). Assessing the Impact of Urban Encroachment on Agricultural Land in Kafr El-sheikh Governorate using GIS and Remotely Sensed Data. CURRENT APPLIED SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, 57-65.
