GIS-based revised universal soil loss equation for estimating annual soil erosion: a case of lower Kulsi basin, India

Assessment and estimation of soil loss is a fundamental aspect of land and water resource conservation and management practices as it provides necessary information in the course of watershed-level development of a region. The soil loss model of Wischmeier and Smith, popularly known as the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation, was selected to estimate soil loss in the lower Kulsi river basin due to its simplicity, versatility, and flexibility nature method in the Geographic information system platform. Most original governmental datasets, mainly daily gauge rainfall from 2009 to 2018, satellite images for land use land cover, digital elevation model of Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission for topographic factor, and National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land-use Planning, India soil map were utilized to estimate the average annual soil erosion. The estimated average annual soil erosion ranges from 0.0 to 6.45 thousand t ha−1y−1, grouped into low, moderate, high, and very high risk of soil erosion. A basin area of 36.235 km2 (1.85%) basin area was identified as high to very high zones of soil erosion risk and needed immediate conservation measures to reduce the erosion risk.