Author(s)

Gnibga Issoufou Yangouliba^1,2,3*, Daniel Kwawuvi^1,2, Adrian Almoradie⁴

¹West Africa Science Service Centre on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use, University of Abomey Calavi, Abomey-Calavi, Benin.
²Laboratory of Applied Hydrology, University of Abomey-Calavi, Abomey-Calavi, Benin.
³Department of Geography, University Joseph Ki-Zerbo, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
⁴Department of Geography, University of Bonn, Meckenheimer Allee, Germany.

In Burkina Faso, rice consumption is currently common and increasing in both, rural and urban areas. Although several efforts have been made by the state to develop land for rice cultivation, the population’s demand is still greater than the supply. Nevertheless, the country has great potential for rice cultivation. This study aims to analyze the suitability of land for rice cropping in the province of Nahouri. Field and satellite data were collected to map the rice crops developed areas. Furthermore, morphopedological, topographic, land use/cover, and accessibility to land data were collected and integrated into a Geographic Information System (GIS) based on simple Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA). Land suitability for rice crop was performed. The results show that the total suitable area for rice cultivation in the province is 106,373 ha (28% of the province) where the most suitable areas cover 32,614 ha and the suitable areas cover 73,759 ha. Already 3144 ha of the province area had been developed for rice cultivation with 815 ha and 845 ha of most suitable and suitable areas respectively whereas more than 45% of the developed lands were not fit for the rice crop suitable land.

Geographic Information System, Land Suitability, Multi-Criteria Analysis, Rice, Remote Sensing

Yangouliba, G. , Kwawuvi, D. and Almoradie, A. (2020) Suitable Land Assessment for Rice Crop in Burkina Faso Using GIS, Remote Sensing and Multi Criteria Analysis. Journal of Geographic Information System, 12, 683-696. doi: 10.4236/jgis.2020.126039.