Agricultural land use change analysis: A study of Taiwan Area

Abstract

Taiwan is a small island with high population density and scarce land resources. Along with economic development, the demand for land by various industries increases, which result in further erosion of agricultural land, and thus causing dramatic change in the landscape. Since 2000, the "Agricultural Development Amendment Act" officially opened the era of free trading for agricultural land. In 2001, the "Farmhouse Construction on Agricultural Land Act" further caused severe impact to rural landscape. Like the case in Yilan, luxury farmhouse eroded farmland, resulting in fragmentation of agricultural land, and even incurred sewage, sunlight and other issues. These problems are commonly seen in Lanyang Plains nowadays. The rapid disappearance of agricultural land not only impact food supply, but also agro-ecosystems and landscape value. This phenomenon is worth taken seriously, and to propose solutions as soon as possible. This study uses Taiwan area as the study site. First, we use satellite images obtained at different times to investigate the change pattern and rate of agricultural land in order to assess the trend of change in this area. Next, through the visualized presentation, we can receive message more directly by the data, and understand the scope and extent of the changes, and speculated the reason behind it.