Multicriteria Analysis by Codification for the Determination of Soil Landscape Units in Forest and Pre-Forest Zones of Cote D’Ivoire: The Case of the Square Degrees of M’Bahiakro and Daloa

The present study, carried out in the forest (Daloa) and pre-forest (M’Bahiakro) zones of Cote d’Ivoire, aims to determine soil landscape units using the coding method. Geological maps and satellite images (SRTM and Landsat) were used for this purpose. The methodological approach adopted consisted in producing maps of slope, geology, land use and topography using the codification method. These various maps, integrated into a GIS using the coding aggregation method, were used to generate soil landscape maps. Twenty-seven (27) soil landscapes have been identified for the pre-forest zone (M’Bahiakro), with a strong dominance of acid rock over a moderate relief under savannah, forest/degraded forest and crops/fallow. However, the forest zone (Daloa), with forty-one (41) soil landscapes identified over the entire zone, is characterized by a majority of mafic rocks on a medium altitude under forest/degraded forest, water and crops/fallow. The criteria used from the codification method (sum of aggregations) made it possible to predict the spatial distribution of soil map units according to agro-ecological environments in the humid intertropical zone. This is essential for the orientation and reinforcement of soil survey tools. However, a comparative evaluation of the different multicriteria analysis methods for coding and weighting soil landscape unit mapping would enable us to identify the most suitable and efficient method for drawing up base maps for soil surveys.

Mapping of Malaria Risk Related to Climatic and Environmental Factors by Multicriteria Analysis in the MarahouéRegion of Côte d’Ivoire

Malaria, a febrile human disease transmitted by female anopheles whose ecology is linked to water, is a major public health problem in Côte d’Ivoire, more precisely in the Marahoué region located in the southwest of the country. In order to effectively control this disease, it is necessary to understand the etiology and the diffusion pattern of the vectors. This justifies this study, which proposes to determine the areas at risk of malaria transmission in order to carry out an effective fight against this disease in this region of Côte d’Ivoire. To achieve this, a combined approach of geographic information systems and multicriteria analysis was adopted. The analysis reveals that the south and northwest of the Marahoué region present a high risk for malaria transmission. This risk is linked to indicators such as climatic factors that cover 48.36% of the study area, environmental factors such as vegetation cover (NDVI), soil moisture (NDWI), altitude, hydrography (water point) and population that covers 55.29% of the area and land use. Also, the results indicated that 50.70% of the region has favorable conditions for malaria transmission. Overall, climatic and environmental indicators are the risk factors associated with the resurgence of malaria.

Modeling of Quaternary Groundwater Pollution Risk by GIS and Multicriteria Analysis in the Southern Part of Abidjan District(Cote d’Ivoire)

The pollution generated by human activities in the area “Vridi canal-Grand Bassam” puts more at risk the quaternary groundwater that supplies water to a large part of the population of the southern part of Abidjan city. This paper deals with the combined approach of geographic information systems and multicriteria analysis to delineate areas at risk of pollution of groundwater in the study area. The multicriteria analysis also incorporated the statistical and geostatistical techniques for defining the factor ratings and weightings of all the parameters under a GIS environment. The criterion for these factor ratings and weightings was the correlation coefficient of each parameter with the nitrates concentration in groundwater. Two indicators were combined for creating situations of pollution risks according to their importance: the intrinsic vulnerability indicators which combined the depth to groundwater, the net recharge, the slope, the soil media, the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity and extrinsic vulnerability characterized by the land use. The results showed that all to the site presents nitrate pollution risks with 50.7% of moderate risk, and 49.3% of high and very high risks. The areas which present the highest risks of pollution are the densely urbanized communes of Treichville, Marcory, Koumasi, Port-Bouet and Grand-Bassam. The sensitivity analysis indicates that parameters causing high sensitivity on the nitrate pollution risks map are the depth to groundwater and the recharge. The errors committed on the maps establishment are ±0.15%, ±0.40% and ±6% respectively for IV map, EV map and pollution risk map.

A Novel IoT Application Recommendation System Using Metaheuristic Multi-Criteria Analysis

There are a variety of Internet of Things(IoT)applications that cover different aspects of daily life.Each of these applications has different criteria and sub-criteria,making it difficult for the user to choose.This requires an automated approach to select IoT applications by considering criteria.This paper presents a novel recommendation system for presenting applications on the IoT.First,using the analytic hierarchy process(AHP),a multi-layer architecture of the criteria and sub-criteria in IoT applications is presented.This architecture is used to evaluate and rank IoT applications.As a result,finding the weight of the criteria and subcriteria requires a metaheuristic approach.In this paper,a sequential quadratic programming algorithm is used to find the optimal weight of the criteria and sub-criteria automatically.To the best of our knowledge,this is the first study to use an analysis of metaheuristic criteria and sub-criteria to design an IoT application recommendation system.The evaluations and comparisons in the experimental results section show that the proposed method is a comprehensive and reliable model for the construction of an IoT applications recommendation system.

Wireless Sensor Network Components for Air Pollution Monitoring in the Urban Environment:Criteria and Analysis for Their Selection

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are fast evolving technology for collecting data in real time. Every wireless sensor network (WSN) is consisted of technical and software components which have to refer to the selected application. The paper focuses on the selection of WSN components. The WSN will be situated in the center of Olomouc City (OWSN). It will focus on measurements of harmful air pollutants and selected basic meteorological elements. The criteria for selection of WSN components including the most important parameters will be chosen and the final evaluation of the option utility will be made on the basis of multicriteria decision making process.

Planning Sports Facilities Based on a Multicriteria Model Built in GIS Environment

The objective of this work is to evaluate the coverage of the sports facilities at Oeiras Municipality,near Lisbon,in Portugal,identifying the well-served areas and those with deficit coverage,according to the national norms for sports facilities programming and characterization,based on a self methodology,in a geographic information system(GIS)environment.For the deficit covered areas,a multicriteria analysis was developed,based on the established national criteria,which allow the identification and prioritization of interventioned areas for sports facilities.The results obtained by the application of this tool enable more informed and more detailed knowledge of the Oeiras Municipality sports supply,providing essential information for decision making in the planning of sports facilities.

Flood Vulnerability Mapping: A Case Study of Okoko Basin, Osogbo

This study employed Geographic Information System (GIS) and remote sensing approach to analyze the flood vulnerability areas in the Okoko basin area of Osogbo in Osun state, Southwestern Nigeria. High-resolution imageries, a Topographic map of the study area and a TCX software program (Version 2.0) were integrated using ArcGis (10.7). Some of the causative factors for flooding in the watershed were taken into account which are: Land use, Distance of buildings to drainage, Digital Elevation Model, and Slope. This study aimed at mapping the flood-vulnerable areas along the Okoko basin of Osogbo. In developing a flood risk/flood hazard map of the study area, and determining the level of expected disaster, a multi-criteria analysis was utilized. The factors considered were ranked in five classes with the highly vulnerable areas having the highest score of “5”. These factors were weighed according to the estimated significance of causing flooding. The study revealed that the study area has an estimated area of 17.85 km2 of which 14.2 km2 falls within the vulnerable areas while 3.6 km2 is on the least vulnerable areas. Moreover, out of 16,829 buildings in the study area, 8204 buildings were found susceptible to flood disasters. This research attempts to equip decision-makers to make accurate decisions and also serves as a mitigation measure for flood disaster management.

Contribution of Geomatics to the Delimitation of Protection Perimeters: Case of Agbo River in Agboville (South-East of Côte d’Ivoire)

The present study aims to delimit protection perimeters around the “Agbo” river in Agboville in order to reduce the risks of pollution of this water resource. The methodological approach consisted first all in assessing the vulnerability of the resource and then in determining the protection perimeters based on the vulnerability map and previous studies. Five parameters (slope, land use, soil type, annual runoff and drainage density) were used. These parameters were then weighted using the Saaty multicriteria analysis method. The vulnerability map reveals four classes (very low, low, medium and high) with a dominance of the low class (41.35% of the area). Three protection perimeters were delineated (immediate, close and remote). The immediate protection perimeter is delimited at a distance of 200 m around the SODECI water intake on the “Agbo” river and covers the areas with a strong influence on the vulnerability to pollution of the river. The closer protection perimeter at a distance of 1000 m, is represented by the zones with strong influence on the vulnerability of the resource and the direction of water flow in the watershed. Finally, the remote protection perimeter covers a large part of the catchment area with a surface area of 510.36 km2 and takes into account the zones that have an influence on the vulnerability to pollution of the resource. These delimited protection perimeters can serve as a guide for the management and protection of the water intake in Agboville as well as for land use planning in this area.

Cartography for the Aquifer Potential Recharge Areas of the Base of the Department of Aboisso(South-East Cote d’Ivoire)

The study highlights the potential recharge areas of the aquifers of the Department of Aboisso for an adequate and rational management of their use. The methodology used consisted in the identification of parameters (land use, soil types, drainage density, slope, induced permeability and alteration thickness) allowing infiltration and their expression as thematic maps. A weighting of these parameters was made by the multicriteria analysis method of Saaty. The integration to GIS conducted to elaborate the map of the potential recharge area of the aquifers for the Department of Aboisso. It brings to light five recharge level classes (bad: 20%;mediocre: 19%, medium: 45%;good: 15% and very good: 1%) in the study area. That map reveals the dominance of good recharge areas covering 61% and practically all over the studied area. They are generally characterized with gentle slopes coupled with mosaics of cultivations and forests, and high induced permeability allowing better infiltration. The zones of low recharge cover 39% of the department’s area, and are mainly located in urban areas inside the streams. This study exhibited that the land use is the preponderant parameter influencing the recharge in base area. This map could be considered as an excellent support for all kinds of activities especially to implement planning in the Department of Aboisso, the setting up of drilling broadbands and the choice of future sites for landfills or landfill of wastes to protect groundwater from any pollution.

An ontology-based multicriteria spatial decision support system:a case study of house selection

The paper proposes an ontology-based multicriteria spatial decision support system(MC-SDSS)for the house selection problem.The house selection ontology serves as a foundation for spatial multicriteria decision analysis(MCDA)in the house selection domain.It is built using the Web Ontology Language(OWL).The ontology represents the spatial MCDA knowledge associated with house selection using semantic machine-interpretable concepts and relationships in such a way that they can be used by machines not just for display purposes,but also for processing,automation,integration,and reuse across applications.It contains concepts(or classes)including quantitative and qualitative criteria(objectives and attributes),decision alternatives(houses for sale),criterion weights,and location attributes of the decision alternatives.The concepts are organized into a hierarchical classification structure using the Analytic Hierarchy Process.To evaluate the decision alternatives,a set of rules is implemented within the OWL knowledge base with the Semantic Web Rule Language.The rules are expressed as combinations of the OWL concepts and their properties.The paper illustrates an implementation of the proposed ontology-based MC-SDSS architecture using a case study of house selection in the City of Tehran,Iran.

Stability Analysis of Ranking Alternatives Based on Subjective and Objective Weight

Weights of criteria are used to assess the relative importance of the different criteria in multicriteria analysis, which can influence ranking result more or less depending on the multicriteria decision-making method used. In this paper, the influences of alternatives′ ranking result associated with the change of weight are discussed by making use of the concept of weight stability intervals based on subjective and objective integrated weighting approach. Meamwhile, A model of weight proportion stability intervals is proposed. a numeral example is used to illuminate how many increment of objective weight can change the ranking results determined by subjective weight.

A Reexamination of Methods of Hierarchic Composition in the AHP

This paper demonstrates that we should use two different hierarchic composition methods for the two different types of levels in the AHP. The first method is using the weighted geometric mean to synthesize the judgments of alternative-type-level elements, which is the only hierarchic composition method for the alternative-type level in an AHP hierarchy, and the rank is preserved automatically. The second one is using the weighted arithmetic mean to synthesize the priorities of the criteria-type-level elements, which is the only hierarchic composition method for all the criteria-type levels, and rank reversals are allowed.

Vulnerability to Earthquake Hazard:Bucharest Case Study,Romania

Recent seismic events show that urban areas are increasingly vulnerable to seismic damage,which leads to unprecedented levels of risk.Cities are complex systems and as such their analysis requires a good understanding of the interactions between space and the socioeconomic variables characteristic of the inhabitants of urban space.There is a clear need to develop and test detailed models that describe the behavior of these interactions under seismic impact.This article develops an overall vulnerability index to seismic hazard based on a spatial approach applied to Bucharest,Romania,the most earthquake-prone capital in the European Union.The methodology relies on:(1) spatial post-processed socioeconomic data from the2011 Romanian census through multicriteria analysis;and(2) analytical methods(the Improved Displacement Coefficient Method and custom-defined vulnerability functions)for estimating damage patterns,incorporated in a GIS environment.We computed vulnerability indices for the128 census tracts of the city.Model sensitivity assessment tested the robustness of spatially identified patterns of building vulnerability in the face of uncertainty in model inputs.The results show that useful seismic vulnerability indices can be obtained through interdisciplinaryapproaches that enhance less detailed datasets,which leads lead to better targeted mitigation efforts.

Entrepreneurship Measurement and Comparison:Holistic Acceptability Global Entrepreneurship Index

The Global Entrepreneurship and Development Institute annually publishes the Global Entrepreneurship Index(GEI)to show entrepreneurship of each country/area.The GEI is obtained by averaging the scores of three sub-indexes,entrepreneurial attitudes,entrepreneurial abilities and Entrepreneurial aspirations.However,this GEI construction method with equal weights for three subindexes may be controversial,since the relative importance among the three sub-indexes may vary across countries and areas due to economic and social/cultural reasons.This study comprehensively considers all possible weights,and formulates an interval entrepreneurship evaluation matrix.Employing the Stochastic multicriteria acceptability analysis,the authors build an improved GEI,which the authors term the Holistic Acceptability Global Entrepreneurship Index.This method differs from the conventional wisdom that assigns exact values to corresponding weights,but explores a weight space considering all possible weight sets.Finally,the proposed method is confirmed using an empirical study measuring and comparing the entrepreneurship of the top 20 countries and areas in terms of 2017 GEI.