Nature Communications (May 2021)

Global land use changes are four times greater than previously estimated

  • Karina Winkler,
  • Richard Fuchs,
  • Mark Rounsevell,
  • Martin Herold

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22702-2
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 12, no. 1
pp. 1 – 10

Abstract

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Quantifying land use change is critical in tackling global challenges related to food, climate and biodiversity. Here the authors show that land use change has affected 32 % of the global land area in six decades (1960- 2019) by combining multiple open datasets to create the HIstoric Land Dynamics Assessment +.