Assessment of soil erosion of Burundi using remote sensing and GIS by RUSLE model

Abstract

This present work is the results of study on water erosion in Burundi, a landlocked country amid the African Great Lakes region where East and Central Africa converge. The agriculture is developed in areas where the slopes is very steep and some factors such as land-use methods weaken soils and lead to water erosion and the results in soil degradation rendering it infertile. Production on this way is becoming insufficient for the rapidly growing of population. The extension of cultivated land often not linked to anti-erosion measures exposes the soil to intense erosion. The results get it of processing satellite images (Landsat 8) allowed to identify the main places where erosion is very severe. Lost soil was estimated by the RUSLE method and using four raster images corresponding to factors related to precipitation, soil erodibility, topography, slope length and vegetation cover. The results obtained allow the identification of areas around all the country where the interventions of government and environment protection institutions are necessary to limit the processes of soil degradation.

Keywords

• burundi
• soil erosion
• land use
• rusle
• soil degradation
• soil classification
• agriculture protection