Use of land Evaluation Modeling and Remote Sensing Technology to Sustainable Management of Agricultural Lands, in Eivanekey Arid Region, Semnan province

Assessment of land response to certain land uses by comparison of its potentialities with existing limitations is necessary to reach the sustainable land management. In this study Almagra model from MicroLEIS decision support system and remote sensing technology were used to determine the suitability of land for winter wheat (Triticum aestivum), maize (Zea mays), alfalfa (Medicago sativa) and Melon (Cucumis Melo) in Eivanekey arid region. Land and soil characteristic data were obtained from representative soil profiles in each land mapping unit, through digital classification of ASTER Satellite images and stored into SDBm plus, the database manager of microLEIS program. The mean average of land characteristics between 0 to 100 cm was calculated by soil layer generator of SDBm plus and entered to the model. Land suitability maps for each crop were presented as thematic maps by integrating soil map with determined land suitability classes in GIS environment. The results of this study showed that %55 of the area has moderate to high suitability for wheat, alfalfa, maize and melon. Salinity, alkalinity and soil texture are considered as the main soil restrictions for studied crops in this area. According to the obtained results, the priority of the selected crops should be considered as wheat, alfalfa/ melon and maize, respectively. Application of remote sensing technology accompany with land suitability models helped to enhance the abilities of this model by both saving the data compilation time and generating georeferenced data to overlay with other information layers and spatialization in GIS.