Earth Systems and Environment

https://doi.org/10.1007/s41748-019-00088-y

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment

in Béni‑Mellal District (Morocco) Using Remote Sensing and GIS
Ahmed Barakat1 · Zainabe Ouargaf1 · Rida Khellouk1 · Aafaf El Jazouli1 · Fatima Touhami2

Received: 10 September 2018 / Accepted: 10 January 2019

© King Abdulaziz University and Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019

Abstract
Urbanization sprawls at the expense of the surrounding land corresponding generally to agricultural land or natural areas.
Therefore, evaluating land use and land cover change (LULCC) is important. In this study, LULCC and its environmental
impact in Béni-Mellal town and the surrounding communes (Morocco) are investigated between 2002 and 2016 using remote
sensing, geographical information system (GIS), and fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (FAHP). Remotely sensed imagery
combined with GIS served to evaluate the typical LULCC dynamics. FAHP allowed calculating the weights of each LULC
class used to generate the map of the environmental impact of LULCC. The results showed that arable fields, built-up and
bare soil classes are increased about 2.75%, 177.81%, and 4.47%, respectively, while arboriculture and forest LULC classes
are decreased about 40.64% and 53.85%, respectively. The environmental degradation map produced with regard to the
LULCC indicated that the lands severely degraded are those transformed from arboriculture to built-up and bare soil, fol-
lowed by those transformed from arable fields to built-up and bare soil, while moderate degradation is marked in areas of
arboriculture transformed to arable fields. To mitigate the degradation of natural resources such as fertile agricultural soil
and fruit trees, we suggest that urban construction should be encouraged in hilly areas in the mountain communes, and the
regional and communal management plans must be developed and respected. As highlighted by this study, combining remote
sensing and GIS could be an effective approach to LULC planning and improving the environment.

Keywords  LULCC · Environmental degradation · Remote sensing · GIS · FAHP

1 Introduction research (Nautiyal et al. 2017), soil erosion, landslides, loss

Monitoring land use and land cover change (LULCC) is
important especially when it results in an inefficient town
planning policy and a rapid and unregulated urbanization,
often anarchic, which are often associated with environmen-
tal threats. Rapid urbanization, i.e., the growth of towns and
infrastructure, sprawls onto the surrounding land usually
made of natural areas, which is generally associated with
land/soil degradation. The land degradation participates in
several major environmental problems such as social science
* Ahmed Barakat
a.barakat@usms.ma
1
Georesources and Environment Laboratory, Faculty
of Sciences and Techniques, Sultan My Slimane University,
Béni‑Mellal, Morocco
2
Interdisciplinary Laboratory of Research in Sciences
and Technologies, Polydisciplinary Faculty, Sultan My
Slimane University, Béni‑Mellal, Morocco
of biodiversity, increase in atmospheric C ­ O2, desertifica-
tion, groundwater pollution (Townshend et al. 2012). Con-
sequently, investigations of LULCC and their environmental
impacts are necessary for achieving sustainable develop-
ment. The spatial and temporal analysis of land use trends
and relationships between the factors driving these varia-
tions would allow for better management of land use.
Several various worldwide studies have been realized to
assess the land use evolution and its environmental impacts
by applying various methods (Abdulkareem et al. 2018;
Barakat et al. 2018a, b; Zadbagher et al. 2018 Hegazy and
Kaloop 2015). Remote sensing and geographic information
systems (GISs) are widely used in the detection of land use
variation. Multi-date remote sensing images provide infor-
mation at a lower cost and help classify the different com-
ponents of land use on a larger scale (Ozesmi and Bauer
2002) using one of the several classification techniques
such as supervision classification, unsupervised classifica-
tion, PCA and fuzzy classification. It also has the advantage

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in the evaluation of the spatial–temporal evolution of land
use using multi-date images (Xian and Crane 2005; Jat
et al. 2008). GIS provides a commonly used tool to explore
information derived from the urban growth remote sensing
images and to detect the land use change. In the literature,
most case studies were conducted using GIS techniques to
explore environmental impacts of growing urbanization
based on the analysis of spatial and temporal relationships
between various land use classes (Xiao et al. 2013; Hegazy
and Kaloop 2015; Song et al. 2015; Abdulkareem et al.
2018; Nautiyal et al. 2017; Zadbagher et al. 2018; Gashaw
et al. 2018).
An inadequate LULCC could undesirably disturb the
environment. To assess the environmental impact of land
use change, many criteria need to be considered such as veg-
etation cover, soil quality, water bodies, urbanization rate,
and population pressure (Jasim et al. 2016). For evaluating
all these criteria not having the equal impact level, various
mathematical methods especially multi-criteria decision-
making methods were applied in determining the weights
of criteria and the scores of sub-criteria. A popular weight
evaluation method is the analytical hierarchy process (AHP)
proposed by Saaty (1977). However, the AHP method is
unable to properly handle the uncertainties and inaccuracies
associated with the mapping of the decision-maker’s percep-
tion to crisp numbers (Chen et al. 2011), and to compensate
for the weakness of this method for dealing with uncertainty.
Kahraman et al. (2004) reported that the fuzzy analytical
hierarchy process (fuzzy-AHP) may reflect the other method
that is most commonly used by several authors (Kilincci and
Onal 2011; Feizizadeh et al. 2014; Mosadeghi et al. 2015)
to solve the fuzzy problem. Extension analysis of the Chang
(1996) method introduces an approach to fuzzy-AHP manip-
ulation with the use of fuzzy triangular numbers to create a
pairwise comparison.
Morocco remains a demographically young country
whose total population has changed 180% over the past
40 years and is expected to reach 42 million people by 2050.
The economic social changes include the migration of the
rural population to large cities, and the development of the
tourism industry has made its mark in the changes observed
in land use and land cover change (Xystrakis et al. 2017).
The population density is highest in the fertile plains and
coastal areas of northwestern Morocco. The urban popula-
tion growth rate of Morocco was reported as 2.16% in 2015
(according to the World Bank collection of development
indicators) which has been climbing for the past decade
due to the increase in population and the migration from
rural areas to cities. All these factors including population
increase, urbanization, and proximity to fertile land affected
natural resources such as forests, water and agricultural land,
transforming them into settlements or industrial areas. For
this reason, it is very important to assess the LULCC for
13
A. Barakat et al.
preparing appropriate land use plans. The case study was
made for the Beni-Mellal town and the surrounding com-
munes, which have experienced a strong urbanization since
the past two decades due to their privileged geographic posi-
tion. So, soil degradation and environmental issues associ-
ated with increasing urbanization and human interventions
are accentuated in the area, recently. A lack of knowledge
about the issue in the study area has led us to conduct the
present investigation to evaluate the LULCC and to map
the environmental degradation based on the evolution of the
LULC classes between 2002 and 2016 using remote sensing,
GIS, and FAHP techniques.
2 Methods and Data
2.1 Study Area
The study area (32°15′ and 32°28′N and 6°28′ and 6°16′W)
is located in Béni-Mellal province, Morocco. It is spread
over an area of 281 km2, lying at the junction of High Atlas
of Béni-Mellal and Tadla plain (Fig. 1). Its topography
ranges in elevation from 490 m to the north to 760 m to
the south of the study area. Administratively, it covered the
rural communes of Sidi Jaber, Foum Oudi, Foum El Anceur,
Ouled Ayich, and Ouled Mbarek, and the urban municipality
of Béni-Mellal. The area has important water resources com-
ing from the Atlas Mountain. It also contains a large amount
of fertile land (Ennaji et al. 2018; Oumenskou et al. 2018;
Barakat et al. 2017) making it a region of high agricultural
production. Agriculture and livestock constitute the main
sector of economic activity and income. Olive and citrus
fruits are the main tree crop in the region.
According to the data of the Moroccan Meteorological
Service, the mean annual temperature is 14.17 °C, with an
average lowest temperature of 1.1 °C observed in January,
and an average highest temperature of 30 °C occurring in
July and August. The annual mean precipitation in this area
is approximately 350–650 mm, with nearly 87% of which is
received from October to March.
According to the 2011 data of Moroccan high commission
for planning (HCP), the total population of the study area has
increased remarkably from 223,667 people in 2004 to 282,072
people in 2014. However, this increase in population led among
other factors an increased land demand for housing and indus-
trial areas that is done at the expense of the fertile agricultural
land. For this reason, it is extremely important to assess the
effect of the land use transformation in the past 15 years.
2.2 Data
The methodology followed in this study is graphically rep-
resented in Fig. 2.
Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment in Béni-Mellal District…

Fig. 1  Geographical location of the study area with validation points

The data used in this study were collected from vari-
ous sources between the years 2002 and 2016 to assess the
LULCC over the time period and to estimate its environ-
mental impact.
Land use maps were prepared using cloud-free remote
sensing satellite images of ASTER acquired in September
2002 and Sentinel-2A acquired on 1 October 2016 (Table 1)
to minimize seasonal changes, the images were acquired
during the same period (dry season). The accuracy of Sen-
tinel-2 and Landsat-8 data classification used to map land
use was assessed by Topaloglu et al. (2016), and the most
accurate classification was obtained by Sentinel-2 data. On
this basis, we decided to use the Sentinel-A2 product to
LULC map in 2016.

Fig. 2  Flowchart showing the

methodology followed in this
study Remote sensing data

Field observation

Pre-processing

Subset (study area)

Validation
Classification
GIS Analysis

LULC Change Detection 2002-

20016

Fuzzy AHP weighting

Environmental degradation map

13

Table 1  Triangular fuzzy numbers of linguistic variables used in this
study
Linguistic scale Triangular fuzzy scale Triangular
fuzzy reciprocal
scale
Equally strong (1, 1, 1) (1, 1, 1)
Moderately strong (2/3, 1, 3/2) (2/3, 1, 3/2)
Fairly strong (3/2, 2, 5/2) (2/5, 1/2, 2/3)
Very strong (5/2, 3, 7/2) (2/7, 1/3, 2/5)
Absolutely strong (7/2, 4, 9/2) (2/9, 1/4, 2/7)
The field visits were carried out in March 2017 to col-
lect information and geographic coordinates of the regions
of interest used for satellite image classification and for
evaluating the result accuracy of this classification. Google
Earth images were used to create the training sites for 2002
and 2016 satellite images and to evaluate the accuracy of
the generated thematic maps. ENVI 5.2, QGIS 2.14.2, and
ArcGIS 10.2.2 softwares were used for the display, pre-pro-
cessing, and processing of data.
2.3 Methodology
The methodology followed in this study is graphically rep-
resented in Fig. 2.
All image pre-processing, calibration, and atmospheric
correction were performed using semi-automatic classifica-
tion plugin extension (Congedo 2016) based on dark object
subtraction (DOS) model in QGIS 2.8.6 software. The dark
object subtraction method (DOS) was developed by Chavez
(1988) to remove the atmospheric effects and to obtain
reflectance at ground images. The study area concerns two
different scenes processed by the image mosaic algorithm.
To have the same resolution between these images, we resa-
mpled the ASTER image at 10 m using the nearest neighbor.
This method does not improve the spatial resolution since it
retains the reflectance values of the original image (Calloz
and Collet 2001). In the end, image-subsetting techniques
were applied to select the study area only.
2.3.1 Image Processing
Based on the Anderson LULC classification system (Ander-
son 1976), these two images have been classified into five
classes, namely (1) arboriculture, (2) arable fields (3) forest,
(4) bare soil, and (5) built up.
The supervised classification method by the vector sup-
port algorithm (SVM) was applied to each image using the
ENVI 5.3 software. This vector support algorithm is one of
the most used supervised classification methods with remote
sensing image data (Khatami et al. 2016; Pelletier et al.
2016). For the vector support algorithm (SVM) application,
13
A. Barakat et al.
the linear kernel type has been used and the gamma parame-
ter (γ) was fixed to 0.2. Similar parameters have been applied
by Ustuner et al. (2015) for land use classification.
The area of interest is chosen based on the ground truth
and the comparison with Google Earth high-resolution
images, synchronized with the acquisition dates of the
images used. The accuracy evaluation of the classifica-
tion was made by the confusion matrices and the Kappa
coefficients.
A comparison image approach was adopted for change
detection analysis during the periods from 2002 to 2016.
The analysis consists in calculating the rates of increase and
loss for each class using a matrix of change (Weng 2001),
produced using ENVI software.
2.3.2 Degradation Index
To get a better understanding of environmental impact under
LULCC especially urbanization, we used the environmental
degradation index (EDI) developed by Jasim et al. (2016).
The formulation of this index is based on the thematic maps
of the change obtained by the post-classification method to
produce the change maps of each class (factor). Then the
FAHP proposed by Chang (1996) were used to calculate the
weights and importance degree of each LULC class.
2.3.3 Theory of Fuzzy‑AHP
In this research, FAHP method was used to evaluate and
weigh LULC criteria allowing an environmental degrada-
tion assessment. Fuzzy-AHP that extends Saaty’s TL AHP
(1980) method addresses to the problems not considered in
AHP such as the imprecision related to the decision maker’s
preference (Smith and Von Winterfeldt 2004) and the ambi-
guity linked to the personal judgment regarding numeric
values. It replaces numerical values of AHP with fuzzy
numbers to express an imprecise or approximate level of
performance rating of each criterion. A pairwise fuzzy com-
parison among criteria is expressed by the linguistic terms,
‘equally’, ‘weakly more’, ‘moderately more’, ‘strongly
more’ or ‘extremely more important’ based on the levels of
preference (Table 2). These linguistic expressions are then
transformed into triangular fuzzy numbers (TFNs). A fuzzy
number à is said a triangular fuzzy number (TFN) if its
membership function is given by Eq. 1 (Cox et al. 1995):
⎧ 0, x < 1,
⎪ (x − l)∕(m − l), l ≤ x ≤ m,
𝜇M̃ = ⎨ , (1)
⎪ (u − x)∕(u − m), m ≤ x ≤ u,
⎩ 0, x>1
where parameters l, m, and u denote, respectively, the lower,
mean, and upper values of TFN (Kahraman et al. 2004)
Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment in Béni-Mellal District…

Table 2  Degree of degradation of each factor

Factors (classes) Degradation LULC change
(alternatives)

Arboriculture Extreme If arboriculture is transformed into buildings (reduction of fertile soils and trees, the probability of contamina-
tion of aquifers in areas where sanitation is absent, destruction of the biosphere)
High If arboriculture is transformed into the bare soil (degradation of fertile soils, degradation of terrestrial ecosys-
tems).
Moderate If arboriculture is transformed into arable fields
Light If arboriculture is transformed forest
No change No change
Arable fields Extreme If arable fields are transformed into buildings (reduction of fertile soils, the probability of contamination of
aquifers in areas where sanitation is not available)
High If arable fields and arboriculture are transformed into bare soil (degradation of fertile soils, degradation of ter-
restrial ecosystems)
Light If the fields are transformed into forest/arboriculture
No change No change
Forest Extreme If the forest is transformed into a building (destruction of forest ecosystems, the probability of contamination of
aquifers in areas where the sanitation network is absent)
High If the forest is transformed into bare soil (degradation of forest ecosystems, the probability of the incidence of
floods above all in agglomerations which is in the foothills of the mountains)
Moderate If the Forest is transformed into fields (forest ecosystem degradation, the probability of landslides incidence
and erosion)
Light If the forest is transformed into arboriculture
No change No change
Bare soil High If the bare soil is transformed into buildings (probability of contamination of groundwater in areas where the
sewerage network is absent, especially since most of the bare soil is exposed limestone formations)
No change No change

( )
( ) ( )−1 1 1 1
M2 M1 ã ij = lij , mij , uij and ã ij = , ,
1 uij mij lij
(3)
for i, j = 1, 2, … n and i ≠ j.

The main steps to apply the fuzzy-AHP approach in this

V ( M2 ≥ M1) D study are described below according to apply Chang’s extent
analysis (Chang 1996).
l2 m2 l1 d u2 m1 u1 Step 1 Calculating the sum of each row the fuzzy com-
parison matrix à and then normalizing the row sums by the
Fig. 3  Intersection between M1 and M2 (Chang 1996) fuzzy arithmetic operation (Eq. 4).
(Fig. 3) used for indicating preferences between criteria. u [ ]−1
∑
m
∑ ∑
n m
represents the degree to which any given element x in the Si = Mgj ⊗ Mgj (4)
domain X belongs to the fuzzy number A.
i i
j=1 i=1 j=1
TFNs expressing expert judgments were then used to rep-
resent the pairwise comparison of the criteria as a matrix with
written as Eq. 2: (m )
� � � �
∑
m
∑ ∑
m
∑
m

⎡ (1, 1, 1) l12 , m12 , u12 ⋯ l ,m ,u ⎤ Mgj = lj , mj , uj (5)

⎢� �−1 � 1n 1n 1n� ⎥ i
� � l , m ,u (1, 1, 1) lin , min , uin ⎥ j=1 j=1 j=1 j=1
= ⎢ 12 12 12
⋯
à = ã ij n×n ,
⎢ ⋯ ⋯ ⋯ ⋯ ⎥
⎢� �−1 � �−1 ⎥ and
⎣ l1n , m1n , u1n lin , min , uin ⋯ (1, 1, 1) ⎦
� �−1 � �
(2) � �
n m
1 1 1
where Mgi = ∑n , ∑n , ∑n , (6)
i=1 j=1
i
i=1
ui i=1
mi l
i=1 i

13

where⊗ denotes the extended multiplication of two fuzzy
numbers. These fuzzy triangular numbers are known to be
relative to each other and are used to represent the weight of
each criterion with respect to the total objective. A weighted
summation is then used to obtain the performance of each
alternative.
Step 2 Computing the degree of possibility of M2 = (l2,  alternatives was determined using Eqs. 12 and 14. The result
m2, u2) ≥ M1 = (l1, m1, u1) is defined by Eq. 7.
( ) [ ( )]
V M2 ≥ M1 = sup min 𝜇M1 (x), 𝜇M2 (y) . (7)
y≥x
Equation 7 can be equivalently expressed as follows:
⎧ 1, if m2 ≥ m1
� � ⎪
V M2 ≥ M1 = ⎨ 0, if l1 ≥ u2 , (8)
l −u
⎪ m −u 1 − 2m −l if Otherwise
⎩ ( 2 2) ( 1 1)
where d is the ordinate of the highest intersection point D
between 𝜇M1 and 𝜇M2 as shown in Fig. 3. To compare M1 and
M2, we need both the values of V (M1 ≥ M2) and V (M2 ≥ M1).
Step 3 Estimating the priority vector (W =(w1, …, wn)T)
of the fuzzy comparison matrix A as follows:
� �
V Sk ≥ Sj j = 1, … , n;j ≠ i
wi = ∑n � � , i = 1, … , n
i=1
V Sk ≥ Sj j = 1, … , n;j ≠ k
(9)
where W is a non-fuzzy number that gives the priority
weights of an attribute or an alternative to the other.
2.4 Case Application
2.4.1 Identification and Extraction of Factors and Elements
of the Environmental Degradation Index
In this study, a model based on fuzzy-AHP is applied to eval-
uate the environmental impact related to LULCC. The evalu-
ation is made using the five LULC classes defined above to
evaluate the LULCC (arboriculture, arable fields, forest, bare
soil, and built up). Each class has five alternatives indicated
as extreme, high, moderate, slight, and no change to describe
the degree of degradation (the degree of change) according
to the linguistic variables shown in Table 3.
These factors were extracted using the pixel-by-pixel
comparison method (post-classification) of images to dis-
criminate the LULCC for the period 2002–2017 and sub-
sequently to identify the potential environmental impact of
this LULCC. Chang’s extent analysis described above was
applied to compare the fuzzy numbers and the final scores
are compared with each other according to the linguistic
variables proposed by Kilincci and Onal (2011) (Table 2).
13
A. Barakat et al.
The different values of the fuzzy synthetic extent of the five
LULC classes calculated are summarized in Table 4.
The same calculation steps were applied to the alterna-
tives, and the values of fuzzy extensions of the alternatives
computed are shown in Table 5.
Then, the minimum degree of possibility of classes and
is presented in Table 6.
2.4.2 Weight Assignment to Classes and Alternatives
After normalization process of the weight vectors, the weight
of each class and each alternative is obtained (Table 7). The
weights obtained were used to generate the environmental
degradation map using ArcGIS software. The model used is
presented by Eq. 10.
( )
EDI = 0.32 × Arboriculturedegradation − Arboriculturegrowth
( )
+ 0.24 × Arables fieldsdegradation − Arables fieldsgrowth
( )
+ 0.21 × Forestdegradation − Forestgrowth
( )
+ 0.15 × Bare soildegradation − Bare soilgrowth
( )
+ 0.07 × Built upgrowth ,
(10)
where EDI is the environmental degradation index.
3 Results and Discussion
3.1 LULC Status
LULC classes were mapped and analyzed. The Kappa coef-
ficients for 2002 and 2016 maps were 0.99 and 0.99, respec-
tively. The overall accuracy (Congalton and Green 2008)
was determinate to evaluate the accuracy of the supervised
classification used in this study for two date, 2002 and 2016,
images with 97% for each date. Knowing that the critical
accuracy value of 75% beyond which a classification is
deemed acceptable (Girard and Girard 2010), these results
indicated the best SVM classification accuracy. The Kappa
coefficients for 2002 and 2016 maps were 0.993 and 0.996,
respectively. The spatial distributional pattern of LULC in
the study area for 2002 and 2016 are represented in Figs. 4
and 5, respectively. This data revealed that in 2002, about
84.88% (237.99 km2) of the study area was occupied by
arable fields, 11.57% (32.73 km2) by arboriculture, 4.01%
(1.43 km2) by built-up land, 1.83% (5.14 ­km2 by barren land,
and 0.19% (0.52 km2) by forest.
During 2016, the area covered by these land categories
was approximately 87.11% (244.53 km2) for arable fields,
Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment in Béni-Mellal District…

Table 3  Synthetic extent of Classes NTF Arboriculture Arable fields Forest Bare soil Built up ∑m j
Mgi
LULC classes j=1

Arboriculture lj 1 2/3 3/2 3/2 3/2 5.34

mj 1 1 2 4 4 10
uj 1 3/2 5/2 5/2 9/2 12
Arable fields lj 2/3 1 2/3 2/3 5/2 5.51
mj 1 1 1 1 3 7
uj 3/2 1 3/2 3/2 7/2 9
Forest lj 2/5 2/3 1 2/3 3/2 4.24
mj 1/2 1 1 1 2 5.5
uj 3/2 3/2 1 3/2 5/2 8
Bare Soil lj 2/5 2/3 2/3 1 2/3 3.41
mj 1/2 1 1 1 1 4.5
uj 3/2 3/2 3/2 1 3/2 6.17
Built up lj 2/9 2/7 2/5 2/3 1 2.58
mj 1/4 1/3 1/2 1 1 3.08
uj 2/3 2/5 2/3 3/2 1 4.24
∑n ∑m �∑ ∑m ∑m � ∑m
j
Mgi = m
l , j=1 mj , j=1 uj j=1 lj
21.08
i=1 j=1 j=1 j
∑m
mj 30.08
∑j=1
m
j=1 uj
39.41
� �−1 0.025
∑ ∑
n m � � ∑n
1
1 1 1 uj
Mgi = ∑n
ui
, ∑n
mi
, ∑n i=1

i=1 j=1
i i=1 i=1 i=1 li

∑n
1 0.033
i=1 mj

∑n
1 0.047
i=1 lj
∑m �∑ ∑m �−1 SArboriculture (0.135, 0.33, 0.57)
j n j
Si = j=1 Mgi ⊗ i=1 j=1 Mgi
SArable fields (0.14, 0.23, 0.43)
SForest (0.11, 0.18, 0.38)
SBare soil (0.09, 0.18, 0.29)
SBuilt up (0.06, 0.10, 0.20)

Table 4  Synthetic extension of alternatives

Arboriculture Forest

Sextreme (0.23, 0.35, 0.51) Sextreme (0.221, 0.32, 0.48)

Shigh (0.16, 0.25, 0.39) Shigh (0.16, 0.25, 0.40)
Smoderate (0.10, 0.17, 0.28) Smoderate (0.11, 0.19, 0.32)
SLeger (0.08, 0.12, 0.20) SLight (0.076, 0.12, 0.20)
Sno change (0.066, 0.098, 0.15) Sno change (0.07, 0.11, 0.19)
Arable fields Bare soil

Sextreme (0.30, 0.43, 0.61) Shigh (0.59, 0.75, 0.94)

Shigh (0.19, 0.29, 0.43)
SLight (0.10, 0.16, 0.25) Sno change (0.22, 0.25, 0.29)
Sno change 0.08, 0.12, 0.18

6.92% (19.43 km2) for arboriculture, 3.97% (11.14 km2) for 3.2 Change Detection

built-up land, 1.91% (5.37 km2) for bare soil, and 0.09%
(0.24 km2) for forest. The analysis of the thematic maps and matrices of changes
of the study area between the periods 2002 and 2016 showed

13
 A. Barakat et al.

Table 5  Minimum degree of possibility of classes and alternatives overgrazing, and degradation of forest. The arable fields and
Classes
the buildings showed an increase of their surfaces between
( )
the periods of 2002 and 2016, which respectively, gained
d� (Arboriculture) = minV SArboriculture ≥ Sk  = 1 6.54 km2/7.13 km2. The barren land has also been increased
( )
d� (Arables fields) = minV SArables fields ≥ Sk  = 0.74 so that it gains a total of surface equivalent to 0.23 km 2. The
( )
d� (Forest) = minV SForest ≥ Sk  = 0.62 forest has been slightly decreased from 0.52 km2 in 2002 to
( )
d� (Bare soil ) = minV SBare soil ≥ Sk  = 0.46 0.24 km2 in 2016, which accounts for − 0.28 km2 (Table 8).
( ) According to the results shown in Table 8 and Fig. 6, the
d� (Built up) = minV SBare soil ≥ Sk  = 0.22
Alternatives
reduction of the area of arboriculture could be explained by
(1) the decrease of the density of this class in some areas over
Arboriculture Forest time (the low density of arboriculture and the young age of
d� (extreme) = 1 d� (extreme) = 1 undetectable trees), and (2) deforestation in other areas. The
d� (high) = 0.23 d� (high) = 0.75 total destruction and reduction of these classes were mainly
d� (moderate) = 0.22 d� (moderate) = 0.46 attributed to human intervention (the expansion of urban
d� (Light) = 0 d� (Light) = 0 planning, the extensive use of chemical products, and the
d� (no change) = 0 d� (no change) = 0 cessation of irrigation of arboriculture fields). To verify the
Champs Sol nu effect of a tree density and age on the detectability of arbo-
riculture in our images, we compared different analysis and
d� (extreme) = 1 d� (high) = 1 visual comparisons using Google Earth. From these analy-
d� (high) = 0.48 d� (no change) = ses, we found that recently cultivated areas and areas with
0
low density are detected as arable fields. After a review of
d� (Light) = 0
the literature on the type of classification used in this study
d� (no change) = 0
to separate fields, arboriculture is called priority classifica-
tion. Due to the generalization of classes, the user is forced
to adjust one of the hundreds of field possibilities to one of
Table 6  Standardized weight of classes and alternatives the existing classes, which may result in the selection of a
class that does not exhibit well the real situation (Küchler
Classes Weight Alternatives Weight
and Zonneveld 1988) (Land cover classification). The arable
Arboriculture 0.32 Extreme 0.55 fields show an increase, which will be attributed to the deg-
High 0.34 radation of arboriculture and forest, and to the decrease of
Moderate 0.11 the surface of the barren land. The degradation of the for-
Light 0 est during the period 2002–2016 is attributed to the human
No change 0 activities (overgrazing, overexploitation of wood resources).
Arable fields 0.24 Extreme 0.67 The matrices of changes for the period 2002–2016 (Table 8)
High 0.32 informed the stability and conversion of certain land use
Moderate 0 classes. It reveals that (1) ≈ 21.25 km2 area of arboriculture
Light 0 has been converted into arable fields, ≈ 0.03 km2 under for-
Forest 0.21 Extreme 0.45 est area, and ≈ 0.15 km2 area under built up; (2) the forest
High 0.34 cover was mainly converted to arboriculture (≈ 0.05 km2)
Moderate 0.21 and arable fields (≈ 0.36 km2); and (3) ≈ 8.10 km2 of arable
Light 0 fields were changed into arboriculture, ≈ 0.09 km2 under for-
No change 0 est area, ≈ 8.19 km2 area under built up, and ≈ 3.40 km2 area
Bare soil 0.12 High 1 under barren land.
No change 0
Built up 0.07 3.3 Environmental Impact Evaluation

In this study, five factors have been identified (arboriculture,

that the arboriculture has been decreased from 32.73 km
in 2002 to 19.43 km2 in 2016 which accounts for − 13.3%
of the total study area compared to the other classes. This
variation can be explained by the decrease in the density of
this class in some areas and by total losses in other areas
due to anthropogenic activities such as urban extension,
2 arable fields, forest, bare soil, and build up) and five assess-
ment items (extreme, high, moderate, slight, and no change)
using GIS software with fuzzy-AHP technique; these vari-
ables were overlaid, and environmental degradation maps
were produced.

13
Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment in Béni-Mellal District…

Table 7  Area of change in Area 2002 Area 2016 Change 2002–2016

different LULC categories from
2 2
2002 to 2016 (km ) (%) (km ) (%) (km2) (%)

Arboriculture 32.73 11.57 19.43 6.92 − 13.3 − 40.64

Arable fields 237.99 84.88 244.53 87.11 + 6.54 2.75
Forest 0.52 0.19 0.24 0.09 − 0.28 − 53.85
Built up 4.01 1.43 11.14 3.97 + 7.13 177.81
Bare soil 5.14 1.83 5.37 1.91 + 0.23 4.47
Total 280.39 100 280.71 100

Fig. 4  LULC map for 2002

The analysis of the environmental degradation map gen-
erated by the weighting of various factors in ArcGIS (Fig. 7)
revealed that soils, which are significantly degraded, are
marked in areas transformed into built-up areas, mainly bare
soil, arboriculture and arable fields. These degradations are
located precisely in the areas undergoing an increased and
rapid urbanization in the urban and suburban agglomera-
tions and along the Béni-Mellal-Casablanca highway and
main roads. The significant deterioration is also apparent
in Adouz, Foum Oudi and Ourbiaa communes that have
witnessed a rapid and uncontrolled and illegal construc-
tion boosted by geopolitical pressure especially during the
Arab spring. These new anarchic urban areas continue to
lack hygiene infrastructure and sewerage system replaced by
septic tanks. Given the calcareous (karstic) nature of land in
these areas, characterized by high permeability, these septic
tanks, and solid wastes leaching can cause contamination
of soil, surface water, and groundwater. The degradation
of the land crossed by road infrastructure (promoting the
development of buildings outside agglomerations) or which
are urbanized is attributed to the destruction of the fertile
soils whose formation has learned times which are very
great. Environmental destruction related to bare soil expan-
sion is observed in areas near Adouz commune, this could
be attributed to exposure of rocks due to the destruction of
shrubs and clumps of dwarf palms and to the degradation of
poorly developed soils through erosion and induced trans-
port mechanisms by the rainwater, especially as the area is
in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains.

13
 A. Barakat et al.

Fig. 5  LULC map for 2016

Due to economic development, rapid population growth, urbanization will always be at the expense of arable soils
rural exodus, and urbanization of rural areas in the study and arboriculture in the study area. Therefore, the concerned
area, encroachment of building on fertile agricultural land communes need to establish plans to address this situation
and olive groves becomes an inevitable process that will by redirecting the urban sprawl along the poor bare land and
not be inconsequential. Moreover, many research stud- in mountain parts of the Piemonte communes, to protect the
ies through the world have shown that urbanization is an fertile agricultural land and to increase agricultural produc-
important type of land transformation (Song et al. 2015; Wu tion that is the dominant economic activity in the study area.
et al. 2016). The continuing increase in not well-planned The unplanned urbanization also exerts high pressure on
water resources resulting into their contamination (Barakat
et al. 2013, 2016), especially since the studied area is in a
Table 8  LULC change matrix from 2002 to 2016 region very reputed by its enormous water reserves. There-
fore, urbanization must be accompanied by the installation
(km2) Initial state (2002)
of basic infrastructure, especially sanitation, mainly in rural
Arboricul- Arable Forest Built up Bare soil agglomerations and slums to protect water resources from
ture fields
anthropogenic pollution (Barakat et al. 2018a, b). Faced with
Final state (2016) this inevitable urban expansion closely linked to regional
 Arboricul- 11.27 8.10 0.05 0 0.01 economic growth and internal migration, regional and local
ture projects must be deployed to upgrade “anarchic” urban
 Arable 21.25 218.21 0.36 1.45 3.22 neighborhoods and to stop unauthorized urban sprawl to
fields
effectively address land use problems such as agricultural
 Forest 0.03 0.09 0.11 0 0
land depletion and water resource contamination.
 Built up 0.15 8.19 0 2.55 0.24
Environmental degradation contains the degradation of
 Bare soil 0.02 3.40 0 0.01 1.94
vegetation and the loss of wetlands, considered important
 Total 32.73 237.99 0.52 4.01 5.14
components of terrestrial ecosystems, because of their vital

13
Land Use/Land Cover Change and Environmental Impact Assessment in Béni-Mellal District…

Fig. 6  Land use/cover change 10

(2002–2016)

Change in Area (km²)

0

-5

-10

-15
Arboriculture Arable fields Forest Built up Barren land
Land Use/ Cover Type

Fig. 7  Environmental degrada-
tion map

importance for land protection, biodiversity, water cycles
and geochemical, climate and many other facets (Turner
et al. 2000). Eccentric use of ecological functions, poten-
tially leads to decreased productivity and biodiversity. In
this study, we identified five factors (arboriculture, arable
fields, forest, bare soil, and bedrock) and six assessment
items (extreme, high, moderate, leger, and no change). These
factors were extracted using the pixel-by-pixel comparison
method (post-classification) of two images representing two
dates separated by a time frame enough to discriminate the
changes and subsequently the identification of the impacts,

13

while evaluation elements have been chosen to describe the
degree of degradation (degree of change).
Research shows that changes in land use are changing
rapidly; the environment is affected. The degradation of the
areas crossed by the road infrastructure or which are urban-
ized is attributed to the destruction of the fertile soils whose
formation has learned times which are very great, it seems to
be aggravated recently. These unwanted LULCCs may have
been favored by inadequate policy measures. For example,
non-farm users have used a large area of cropland because of
economic growth and high-tech industrial parks. However,
the province of Beni-Mellal recognized that soil degradation
was even more advanced. Although some basic strategies
have been implemented, the situation has been improved
and the situation is much better. Attempts should be made
to adopt. Therefore, environmental change monitoring and
regional planning in this region should become a priority.
Analysis of environmental degradation demonstrated that
environmental destruction related to bare soil expansion is
observed in areas near Adouz, which could be attributed
to exposure of rocks and erosion of poorly developed soils
through erosion and induced transport mechanisms by the
rainwater, especially as the area is in the foothills of the
Atlas Mountains.
4 Conclusion
With the growing urbanization among the study areas,
assessing LULC and their change is of specific impor-
tance. The present study attempted to analyze the temporal
LULCC during the period 2002–2016 and its environmental
impact using bi-temporal remote sensing images and GIS
techniques.
The analysis of thematic maps of change showed a contin-
uous increase of arable fields, build-up and bare soil classes,
and a decrease of arboriculture and forest land from 2002
to 2016. The reduction of agricultural land represented by
arboriculture is connected to the grubbing-up of fruit trees
(orange and olive) linked to the drought and water stress and
to urban growth. The main factors of built-up land expansion
are population growth and internal migration stimulated by a
favorable regional economic context. The conversion of agri-
cultural land and forest land to built-up land has caused var-
ied environmental degradation in the study area. According
to the produced environmental degradation map, the lands
severely degraded are those transformed from Arboricul-
ture to built-up and bare soil, followed by those transformed
from arable fields to built-up and bare soil, while moderate
degradation is marked in areas of Arboriculture converted
to arable fields. To mitigate the degradation of natural
resources such as fertile agricultural soil, fruit trees, and
water resources, we suggest that urban construction should
13
A. Barakat et al.
be encouraged in hilly areas in the mountain communes,
and the regional and communal management plans must be
developed and respected, and the unplanned constructions
must be stopped.
The acquired results also confirmed that the combination
of remote sensing tools, GIS and fuzzy-AHP techniques,
could be an effective approach for LULC planning and
improving the environment.
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