Assessing application of Markov Chain analysis in Nakuru

Abstract

Land use/cover change is a major global environmental change issue and projecting these changes is essential for the assessment of environmental impacts. In this study, combined use of satellite remote sensing, geographic information systems (GIS), and Markov chains stochastic modeling techniques were employed in analyzing and projecting land use/cover changes. The results indicate that there has been a notable and uneven urban growth with a substantial loss in forest land and that the land use/cover change process has not stabilized. The study demonstrates that the integration of satellite remote sensing and GIS can be an effective approach for analyzing the spatio-temporal patterns of land use/cover change. Further integration of these two techniques with Markov modeling was found to be beneficial in describing, analyzing and projecting land use/cover change process. The projected land use/cover for 2015 show a substantial increase in urban and agricultural land uses in the study area to a deeper extent.