Anthropogenic Threats to Degraded Forest Land in the Savannahs’ Region of Togo from 1984 to 2020, West Africa

This study focuses on the landscape dynamics of the savannahs’ region in the far north of Togo. Based on a literature review and satellite images analysis using GIS and remote sensing, the study aims to ascertain the effects of anthropogenic threats on the forest coverage of the Savannahs’ Region between 1984 to 2020. The objective is to clarify the dynamics of land use in the region from 1984 to 2000 and from 2000 to 2020. The findings indicate a significant decline in forest coverage within the region from 1984 to 2020, a trend attributed to land use patterns. Dry forests in the Savannah region are largely converted to farmlands, housing, dry savannahs or agroforestry parks, leading to a steady reduction in forest areas.

Long Term Evaluation of Green Vegetation Cover Dynamic in the Atacora Mountain Chain(Togo) and its Relation to Carbon Sequestration in West Africa

The research was done in the Atacora Mountain chain in Togo which tended to assess the change of vegetation cover during a 24-year period.It also aims to evaluate the dynamic of the net primary productivity(NPP) of the living plants over the same period.The Landsat imagery covering three different periods(1987, 2000, and 2011) was pre-processed to correct atmospheric and radiometric parameters as well as gapfilling the 2011 SCL-off images.Then, the vegetation indices such as NDVI(normalized difference vegetation index), SR(simple ratiovegetation index), SAVI(soil-adjusted vegetation index), and CASA(carnegie- ames- stanford approach)model for NPP were applied on these images after masking the study area.The results showed a quiet decrease in the vegetation cover.The vegetation loss was more significant from 2000 to 2011 than from1987 to 2000, and anthropogenic activities can be deemed as the main cause of the vegetation loss.The biomass assessment by NPP computation also showed a decrease over the time.Similar to the change of the vegetation cover, the ecosystem net productivity was very low in 2011 compared to 2000 and 1987.It seems that the general health condition of thevegetation, including its potentiality in carbon sinking,was negatively affected in this area, which has already been under threatened.A perpetual monitoring of these ecosystems by means of efficient techniques could enhance the sustainable management tools of in the framework of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation(REDD).

Satellite monitoring of land-use and land-cover changes in northern Togo protected areas

Remote-sensing data for protected areas in northern Togo, obtained in three different years （2007, 2000, and 1987）, were used to assess and map changes in land cover and land use for this drought prone zone. The normalized difference vegetation index （NDVI） was applied to the images to map changes in vegetation. An unsupervised classification, followed by classes recoding, filtering, identifications, area computing and post-classification process were applied to the composite of the three years of NDVI images. Maximum likelihood classification was applied to the 2007 image （ETM＋2007） using a supervised classification process. Seven vegetation classes were defined from training data sets. The seven classes included the following biomes： riparian forest, dry forest, flooded vegetation, wooded savanna, fallows, parkland, and water. For these classes, the overall accuracy and the overall kappa statistic for the classi- fied map were 72.5% and 0.67, respectively. Data analyses indicated a great change in land resources; especially between 1987 and 2000 proba- bly due to the impact of democratization process social, economic, and political disorder from 1990. Wide-scale loss of vegetation occurred during this period. However, areas of vegetation clearing and regrowth were more visible between 2000 and 2007. The main source of confusion in the contingency matrix was due to heterogeneity within certain classes. It could also be due to spectral homogeneity among the classes. This research provides a baseline for future ecological landscape research and for the next management program in the area.