GIS and remote sensing-based physical land suitability analysis for major cereal crops in Dabo Hana district, South-West Ethiopia

Land suitability analysis is a prerequisite for sustainable agricultural production. This study was aimed at evaluating the current physical land suitability for major cereal crops: teff, wheat, barley and maize in the Dabo-Hana district, Bunno Bedelle Zone, Southwest Ethiopia. A GIS and RS technique with a multi-criteria evaluation approach was applied for evaluating the physical land suitability for the major crops. Various physical land attributes, namely temperature, rainfall, altitude, slope, soil (soil depth, PH, texture, and drainage), land use land cover, accessibility to market and proximity to road have been used as input parameters. Physical land suitability maps were generated for the major cereal crops. The optimum vector overlay analysis results revealed that from the total area, 15,298 ha (20.34%) and 12,494 ha (16.8%) is highly suitable and moderately suitable for all teff, wheat, barley, and maize crop production, respectively. The remaining area has a mixed suitability status (suitable for some crops and unsuitable for others) for all the analyzed crops. This study demonstrated that based on physical land suitability analysis the study area has huge potential for cereal crop production. Topographic factor (altitude) and climatic factors (temperature and rainfall) are the dominant factors that influence the suitability of agricultural land for the major crops in the study area. This study report urges the concerned stakeholders to properly use and adopt precisely the optimum physical land suitability planning to expend the present land resources for more cereal crop productivity in a sustainable manner for better socio-economic development of the region.