Detection of Regional-Scale Conversion of Sabah's Mangrove Forest to Aquaculture Using Change-Point Analysis of MODIS Teris-Series Data

• Main Author: Nurul Aini, Kamaruddin
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: S Agriculture (General); SD Forestry
• Online Access: http://eprints.unisza.edu.my/5056/1/FH02-FBIM-17-11595.pdf; http://eprints.unisza.edu.my/5056/
• Institution: Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin

The deforestation of Sabah’s mangrove forests for aquaculture activities has been conducted massively. As a result, the extent and diversity of these forests are declining at an alarming rate and the remaining mangrove forests are mostly in degraded condition. Continuous monitoring using low-cost remotely sensed data would be a useful technique to monitor the changes of mangrove forests. The objective of this study is to demonstrate the potential of MODIS time-series data for detecting and monitoring the deforestation of mangrove forests in Mengkabong, Sabah. A simple robust statistical method of change analysis is developed and applied to MODIS enhanced vegetation index (EVI) time-series data. The findings of this study confirm that the technique can be applied to determine the history of mangrove deforestation and aquaculture development in Mengkabong for a 14 year period (2000-2013). With the continuation of satellite data acquisition using MODIS sensors, this method could also be useful to monitor and verify the changes of Sabah’s mangrove forests in the future.