West Africa Land Use Land Cover Time Series

This series of three-period land use land cover (LULC) datasets (1975, 2000, and 2013) aids in monitoring change in West Africa’s land resources (exception is Tchad at 4 kilometers). To monitor and map these changes, a 26 general LULC class system was used. The classification system that was developed was primarily inspired by the “Yangambi Classification” (Trochain, 1957). This fairly broad class system for LULC was used because the classes can be readily identified on Landsat satellite imagery. A visual photo-interpretation approach was used to identify and map the LULC classes represented on Landsat images. The Rapid Land Cover Mapper (RLCM) was used to facilitate the photo-interpretation using Esri’s ArcGIS Desktop ArcMap software. Citation: Trochain, J.-L., 1957, Accord interafricain sur la définition des types de végétation de l’Afrique tropicale: Institut d’études centrafricaines.