Assessment of desertification intensity in Roudab Sabzevar area by using MICD Model

Desertification as a great problems affect most of the countries in the world especially developing countries. Desertification phenomenon that occurs in arid, semiarid and semi-wet regions will reduce the land potential. For evaluation and mapping of desertification many researches have been conducted leading to regional and local models. From among the many methods of identification of areas susceptible to desertification the Modified Iranian Classification of Desertification (MICD) was chosen. Based upon MICD the map for the present status of desertification for Roudab Sabzevar area with an area of 64900.14 ha was prepared. In this research, at first by combining information from topographic and geologic maps, satellite images and field survey, the area was divided into 10 geomorphological facies, each of which was considered as the main unit for evaluation of desertification. That, through it the working units of this region were prepared as the base map for evaluating to consider the factors and indices by geomorphology method. Also, in order to prepare the desertification intensity condition of this region, the desertification intensity of various applications was determined and relative plans to current desertification of each land use were prepared after evaluating wind erosion indices and accumulating their scores for each working unit based on reference tables. The results indicate that the studied region is divided into the two following classes: 1- high desertification intensity class, of 10900.93 ha (% 65.77) area. 2- Low desertification intensity class, with an expansion of 10255.24 ha (%6.17) area.