Spatial pattern of farmland change trajectories in arid zone of China

This study attempts to analyse the spatial pattern of land cover change trajectories derived through multi-temporal remote sensing image processing. The study is based on a previous study which utilise the landscape metrics to analyse the spatio-temporal pattern of farmland change trajectories in an arid environment of western China. The focus of this paper is on the ephemeral farmlands that were cultivated and abandoned in succession during the study period. The multi-temporal images were firstly classified independently and farmland change trajectories were established using GIS. Then the "abandoned farmland" and "ephemeral farmland" trajectories were identified and further classified according to the change scenarios. The spatial pattern of these ephemeral farmlands were analysed to explore the nature and causes of the change, particularly the likelihood of farmland abandonment which has been recognised as a major reason for land degradation of China's aridzone.