Detailing rural land use of Coastal Bangladesh: A micro-level study

Abstract

Bangladesh is a small country of 147,570 km2 with a population of around 160 million. Using each parcel of land prudently is crucial for proper development. Information on existing land use is thus of utmost importance for better use of land. Present researches on land use are confined mainly to change detection or pattern analysis of mainly urban areas . As rural areas comprise more settlement areas than urban, this study attempts to depict the existing plot-to-plot use of land in rural areas of coastal Bangladesh. Two union parishad were selected randomly and base map of those areas were collected. For collection of detailed land use data, plot to plot survey was conducted by using fractional code method. Results show that agriculture is dominant in one union, and residential area is dominant in another area and like other parts of the country three seasonal variation of crop production occur here. Overall area proportions of the studied areas are also provided. The overall exercise provides a detailed and comprehensive scenario of the area which should help policy makers to plan accordingly, and fills a literature gap on Bangladesh land use.