| dc.description.abstract | In the past few decades Africa has been experiencing a high population growth rate compared to other continents. The peri-urban areas have been noted to have a higher growth rate in population as the cities expands outward encroaching into the prime agricultural lands in the peri-urban areas. In Kenya, the capital city Nairobi continue to grow and to expand outward and encroach into Kiambu Sub-County. This research focused on the use of remote sensing and GIS tools to detect land use and land cover changes, analysed them and their implications on peri-urban agriculture. Multispectral images from Landsat Thematic Mapper, Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus (ETM+) and OLI were used as a source for satellite images. Images obtained were for the years 1995, 2000, 2014 and 2018. These images were analysed using ARCGIS and ERDAS Imagine.
This research involved digital image classification of the satellite image using the supervised classification technique to classify images. The results revealed that agricultural land is reducing at an alarming rate by being converted to built-up areas. In the year 2018, agricultural land had reduced from 8429.67 Ha in 1995 to 4376.52 Ha. This means that 4053.15 Ha of prime agricultural land had been converted into built up areas within a period of 23 years. In terms of percentage, agricultural land declined by 38.02% within 23 years. The research revealed that land use conversion was accelerated by increase in population which ultimately increased the demand for housing. The real estate developers were noted to be the main agents of land use conversion. Low returns from agricultural output forced farmers to abandon farming and engage in attractive and lucrative business in housing and other uses. This has affected the agricultural production posing a serious threat to food security in the area. Many employees who relied on agricultural related jobs were rendered jobless and this increased the poverty levels
This research recommends the need for land management bodies to create and regularly update the land use plans to regulate conversion of land in the sub-county. There is also need to enhance agricultural practices by encouraging intensive farming, precision agriculture and urban agriculture. In an effort to improve returns from farming, there is need to improve marketing through formation of strong cooperative societies, training on modern farming technologies and value addition through pre-processing. This would slow down the rate of conversion of agricultural land and conserve agricultural land thereby ensuring food security. | en_US |
