Research project BL/V/26 (Research action BL)
This four-year bilateral project will study land use change in two contrasting regions, the Northern Vietnamese Mountains and the Red River Delta. Remote sensing data have proven to be effective land use change monitors, especially in poorly accessible, remote areas; and offer opportunities to document land use change for a wide variety of environments. However, off-the shelf technology does not always allow detecting significant changes, especially in areas with steep topography and/or a strong landscape fragmentation. The large spatial heterogeneity in land dynamics that is observed in Vietnam, and the presence of important local gradients in socio-economic development and environmental degradation afford an opportunity to unravel several key questions regarding socio-economic and environmental controls and feedbacks of land use dynamics in two contrasting regions.
More specifically, this project aims to evaluate land use change under the impact of socio-economic development using novel techniques, and to assess its effect on environmental services as well as on local climate. Through applied research, this project will contribute to improve the capacity of Vietnam National University, Hanoi in the field of applied research on climate change impacts and to promote the cooperation between Vietnam and Belgium on R&D for local sustainable development, in a global climate context.
The project activities are targeted to improve the capacities of Vietnamese partners in advanced image processing techniques (cognitive and fuzzy classification, pre-classification change detection) applicable to the land use change patterns detection. In terms of modelling, VNU-HNs desires to develop its capacities in spatial modelling techniques that allow to include socioeconomic data will be integrated with the effect of land use change scenarios on GHG emissions.
