Assessing Forest Health using Geographical Information System Based Analytical Hierarchy Process: Evidences from Southern West Bengal, India

Vegetation plays an important role in sustaining the ecological biota and maintaining the equilibrium of environment. Thus, assessing vegetation status includes analyzing ecological dynamism, enough soil nutrients and vegetation health. Nearly 24% area of the India is under forest providing a range of resources to local communities. Bankura district has substantial forest cover comprising three divisions i.e., north Bankura division, south Bankura division and Panchet division. Nearly 1463.56 km2 territorial extent of the district comes under forest jurisdiction constituting 21.27% of the total geographical area of the district. Per capita availability of forest in this district is 0.046 ha which is lower than the other districts of south western districts of West Bengal. Therefore, it is essential to analyze the health of vegetation in this region. Present study aims to analyze the forest health using different indices namely Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), Greenness Index (GI), Shadow Index (SI), Normalized Difference Bareness Index (NDBaI), Normalized Difference Built-up Index (NDBI) Perpendicular Vegetation Index (PVI), and Normalized Difference Moisture Index (NDMI) during 1990 and 2019 using Landsat 5 TM (1990) and Landsat 8 data (2019) under the model of Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). Results revealed that forest health was largely affected during the study period due to land transformation and disturbances created by anthropogenic activities. Findings of the study based on this 29-year spatio-temporal vegetation dynamics will ameliorate the local stake holders for managing and maintaining the health of vegetation in the study area.