Gis-based Conservation Priority Area Identification In Mojo River Watershed On The Basis Of Erosion Risk

The identification of priority areas for the establishment of control measures is one of the firstrnobjectives of conservation plans. Since it is not possible to launch watershed managementrnprojects all over the watershed at the same time, it is very important to use some method tornprioritize micro-watersheds. A particular sub-watershed may get top priority due to variousrnreasons but often, the intensity of land degradation is taken as the basis. In this study,rnprioritization of micro-watersheds has been done on the basis of soil erosion risk. Arnmethodology, based on Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) and Multi-criteriarnAnalysis (MCA), has been applied using remotely sensed data, together with other ancillaryrndata in a GIS environment. The analysis shows that RUSLE and MCA help to categorizernlandscape units into different levels of erosion risk and identify areas that require priority inrnconservation measures in relative to others. Based on the RUSLE model, the potentialrnaverage annual soil loss of each parcel of land in the watersheds ranges from 8.57 torn134.46t/ha/year with a mean annual soil loss of 21.2t/ha/year. The result showed that veryrnhigh soil loss (82.6134.5/rnha/yr) is observed in MW6 and Six MWs (7, 9, 12, 14, 20, and 25) fellrnunder high soil erosion classes (59.9 82.6t/rnha/yr). About 40% of the micro-watersheds fall inrnbelow the annual average soil loss of the entire watershed. Based on the MCA approach,rnmicro-watershedwise Composite Erosion Index (CEI) indicates that only MW 6 is under ‘Veryrnhigh’ category with mean CEI above 2.11. The area covered under this category is 60.75 Km2rn(3.69%). ‘High’ category is represented by 9 MWs (29.09%) covering 478.77 Km2 area. Thernlandscape positions where steep slope, poor surface cover, erodible soil and gully erosionrncoincided show high erosion risk compared to others. As a result the critical microwatershedsrnwhich are under very high and high category were selected and recommended tornbe intervened for conservation measures to reduce on-site soil loss and their off-site effects.rnKeywords: GIS, Remote Sensing, Priority area, RUSLE, MCA, Mojo River watershed

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