Ecological and gender impacts of land use cover change in Southern Ethiopia: Review

The rapid rate of land use and land cover change and associated dramatic dynamics over the past decades, has caused the fear that it will be one of the major environmental challenges facing the Earth over the next century. Land cover change imposes adverse ecological impact particularly through modification of natural processes of biotic and abiotic interactions. The main objective of this review is to analyze land use land cover change (LULCC) and its adverse ecological and gender impacts in southern Ethiopia. In southern part of the country, most studies started by analyzing remotely sensed data of land cover from second half of 20th century. For this review, eleven journal articles data on analyzing satellite images of LULCC in southern Ethiopia accessed and reviewed from different agro-ecological zones were considered. Besides, additional 65 materials including journal articles, documents and reports were also included. In southern Ethiopia available evidences indicate that absence of land use planning, inadequate land tenure, and agricultural and settlements expansions are the major causes of LULCC. In agricultural suitable crop and agro-forestry land, settlements are common expanding types of land use in expense of forest lands. In range lands bushlands show decreasing trends in some areas and increasing in others while grassland, settlement and cultivation increased, however, scarcity of studies limit understanding general way of change. The LULCC impact on biotic and abiotic environment was assessed and remarkable impacts were identified. The LULCC was identified as major factor of shrinkage of forest cover and ecological degradation which contributed to plant and animal biodiversity threat and loss including deterioration in the soil seed banks, physical and chemical soil quality decline, decline in Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) and other plant nutrients and lower agricultural productivity. Nearly half share of income from forest products among forest dependent women indicate that loss of forests grossly affect women empowerment.