Land-cover changes and deforestation drivers in the forest landscape of Banmauk township in the Sagaing Region of upper Myanmar

This study focused on the extent of land-cover changes and prediction of probable factors in deforestation based on changes observed from 2000 to 2021 in the forest landscape of Banmauk Township in Myanmar’s Sagaing Region. Landsat 7 ETM+ and Landsat 8 OLI satellite imagery were used to identify seven land-cover classes via supervised random tree classification, and binary logistic regression analysis was used to predict the potential for biophysical and locational factors to affect deforestation. A stratified random sampling method was used to assess the accuracy of the classified maps and to estimate the areas. The study revealed that dense forest coverage decreased from 45.65% in 2000 to 29.01% in 2021, while open forest areas increased from 49.33% to 54.51%. Mining areas exhibited a considerable increase from 0.37% to 5.35%, while settlement and barren/scrub land areas increased from 0.16% to 0.51% and 1.71% to 7.70%, respectively. Agricultural areas slightly increased from 2.11% to 2.33%, while water areas remained almost the same at around 0.60%. Post-classification change detection analysis showed that deforestation occurred mainly through converting forest land to mining and barren/scrub land. The study indicated that lower altitudes and road accessibility are significantly associated with the potential for deforestation.