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Geographical information system techniques in land use assessment within landscape types in Eastern Poland
Author(s) -
Ołdak A.
Publication year - 1992
Publication title -
land degradation and development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.403
H-Index - 81
eISSN - 1099-145X
pISSN - 1085-3278
DOI - 10.1002/ldr.3400030307
Subject(s) - land use , agriculture , sustainable development , work (physics) , business , agricultural land , resource (disambiguation) , natural resource , sustainable land management , land management , environmental resource management , natural resource economics , geography , environmental science , computer science , economics , civil engineering , mechanical engineering , computer network , ecology , archaeology , political science , law , engineering , biology
Agricultural land use in much of Poland is based on traditional methods in which innovation plays a small part. The recent economic changes which have swept through Poland will result in many new opportunities for farmers as new crops, new marketing techniques and new markets become available. Intensification of agricultural land (and forestry) land use can be achieved to meet the growing demand for indigenously produced foodstuffs and timber and, at the same time, allow an increase in income generation (in raw and value‐added products) especially from the export market. Intensification of output must be based on sustainable and environmentally friendly methods with minimal reliance on imported fertilizers and pesticides. This paper explains how a database consisting of soil, topography, land use and vegetation data has been used to generate a series of potential land use maps for a small area (25 km 2 ) of Eastern Poland in which different levels of management inputs have been applied. A prime objective of this work has been the development of a sustainable agroforestry system based on the assessment of the landscape's natural conditions. The system, when fully developed, should allow effective economic management of the area with depletion of the environmental resource base reduced to a minimum. The results of this study rely on the use of computer‐generated maps prepared with a widely available geographical information system.