Journal of Spatial Analysis

Land degradation in arid, semi-arid and sub-humid areas, leads to  desertification and land degradation is a concept that refers to any reduction of soil potentials. In Iran, that 85 percent of its area is classified in arid and semi-arid climates, and  one percent per annum growth rate of desertification and its increasing trends, finding ways to evaluate this phenomenon and its causes in the form of models seems essential. In Iran, especially southern areas due to their arid climatic conditions, are considered to be areas prone to desertification. This study aims to evaluate and analyze the vulnerability of desertification in the Mond watershed located in the northern coast of the Persian Gulf.

     In order to evaluate the potentials of desertification in the Mond watershed, geological, the erosion (water erosion potential), rainfall, slope, elevation levels and land use maps are used.  To identify vegetation cover conditions Landsat ETM + sensor data and normalized vegetation index (NDVI) are used.

     Where in reflected in the near-infrared band (Band 4, Landsat ETM+) and the reflection in the visible band (band 3 sensor ETM+) respectively. Overlaps and combines the above criteria is done using E-VIKOR (VIKOR developed) a method of multi-criteria decision-making models (MCDM). This method is based on a compromise plan proposed in the compromise solution is justified determines solutions that are as close to the ideal solution and has been created through special credit decision-makers. VIKOR use linear approach normal. The normal value in VIKOR  is not related method unit of measure. Also standardization effective indicators of desertification has been done using a linear scale.

      In this study, the ANP method (Analytical Network Process) was used for weighting criteria. Analysis method Network, is one of the popular methods of multi-criteria decision problems. This method complex relationship between and among the elements of the decision by replacing hierarchical network structure considers. Table 1 shows the weights of the effective criteria in desertification. In this study 7 criteria are used that results show criteria’s of climate and vegetation, have the most effective measures in the area of desertification and erosion (water and wind) have the least amount of importance in the region.

Table 1: weight criteria of effectivein desertification

    After mapping the effective indicators in evaluating desertification separately, Standardization of maps, weighting the index, To obtain amount and   , Finally, the amount of , was produced Zoning map of desertification that in it Mond watershed in the province Bushehr in terms of desertification is divided into five ratio and the area is provided in Table 2.

Table 1: Percentage and  area zone of desertification

    Studies show that more than half of the Mond basin have on the surface with average risk of desertification and In the continuation of the current trend of soil degradation, desertification prone zones and will be reduced all lead to the deterioration of the natural ecosystems and human life quality.

Hazard is potential source of harm or a situation to create a damage. So identification of zones exposed to hazards is necessary for planning or land use planning. But this situation becomes more critical when they appear at the population centers. So applying the principle of passive defense based on environmental capabilities is unarmed action that caused the reduction of human resources vulnerability, buildings, equipment, documents and arteries of the country against the crisis by natural factors such as drought, flood, earthquake, etc. Considering the possible occurrence of such risks in population centers, ready to deal with what is known unpleasant and undesirable consequences is necessary. On this basis and given the importance of population centers in Helle and Mond basins, in this study, the authors tried to analyze the Rain hazards of drought and flood.

The study area,Helle and Mond basins, with about 21,274, 47653 km² area, respectively are located in the south of Iran. The Helle basin approximately is between 28° 20'N and 30° 10'N latitudes and between 50° E and 52° 20'E longitudes and Mond basin is between 27° 20' and 29° 55' latitudes and between 51° 15' and 30° 27'E longitudes.These basins are located in sides of a massive sources of moisture, Persian Gulf.

In this study, data from 23meteorological and synoptic stationsstations, during aperiod of20 years (1992-2011)in northern region of the Persian Gulf (Mond and helle basins)were used to calculate Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). The data were collected by the Iranian Meteorological data website (http://www.weather.ir). The SPI is primarily a tool for defining and monitoring drought events. This index may be computed with different time steps (e.g. 1 month, 3months, 24 months). The SPI is defined for each of the above time scales as the difference between monthly precipitation (xi) and the mean value ( ), divided by the standard deviation. To assess flood risk zones, the flood, annual evapotranspiration, cities and populations centers layers were collected in Helle and Mond basins position. The annual precipitations and the SPI maps were drawn by Geostatistics, Kriging. It also the flood and annual evapotranspiration layers were weighted by Euclidian distance method, separately. Finally, all layers are weighted by AHP and fuzzy-linear methods (descending and ascending linear function) into vulnerable layers. The final map of vulnerable areas with flood and drought high risk was drawn based on the algorithm of linear-Fuzzy in a raster format.

According to the results, eastern, north eastern and south eastern part of Mond basin had high annual precipitation. Based on this result, it said that these parts of study area were known the least dangerous areas of vulnerability. The results also showed that with passing of the western regions and going to the center of the study area the annual rainfall have been added over the years. Kazeron, Chenar Shahijan, Firouz Abad, Borm plains and some parts of Khane Zenyan and Dash Arzhan are cities located in this regions. Low latitude, Proximity to the warm waters of the Persian Gulf, low annual precipitation and high temperature causing evaporation and inappropriate environmental conditions in Boushehr province and some coastal cities such as Genaveh, Deilam, Boushehr, Baghan, Lar and Khonj. Accordingly, west, north west, south and south west regions in Helle basin were located in extreme vulnerability zone with a loss of annual rainfall for drinking and agricultural production and poor nutrition underground aquifers.