Climate Change Impact on Land Use and Land Cover Change on Saint Martin's Island, Bangladesh

Coral islands like Saint Martin’s have long been recognized as being particularly vulnerable to the consequences of climate change. Based on this hypothesis, the broad aim of this research work was to explore the environmental condition of Saint Martin's Island through a geographical illustration of the present status of the landform, and land use and land cover (LULC) characteristics. Both primary and secondary data were used to conduct the research work. Different types of landforms of the island with concerned land use characteristics have been explored through direct field observation. The collected data were analyzed in ArcGIS. Field-level elevation data were collected with global positioning system (GPS) during the field visit, which was used for ground truthing. Secondary data sources include the tidal fluctuation data from the BNHOC and satellite images from Google Earth Pro. The research found rapid changes in the LULC with a sharp increase in built − up areas, and the average tidal fluctuation station value increased by 0.30 metre from 1977 to 2018. This research also found that the total terrestrial area is decreasing due to sea − level rise (SLR). The landform over 3.50 metres is relatively safer from exposure to tidal fluctuation. This study concludes with recommendations to assess and identify the inundation level due to SLR and tidal fluctuation for formulating an effective coastal environment conservation policy.