Assessment Of Land-Use And Land Cover Dynamics Of Loktak Lake (Central Zone) And Its Surrounding Using Geo-Spatial Technology

Abstract

Loktak Lake, the largest freshwater lake in North-Eastern India and a Ramsar wetland of international importance, has undergone significant land use/land cover (LULC) changes in recent decades due to natural dynamics and human activities. This study analyses spatio-temporal LULC changes in the Central Zone of the Loktak Lake from 2003 to 2023 using multitemporal Landsat data (Landsat-7 ETM+ and Landsat-8 OLI). Supervised maximum likelihood classification was applied in ERDAS, supported by GIS analysis in ArcGIS and QGIS, to classify four LULC categories: water bodies, vegetation, agricultural land, and built-up areas. Classification accuracy was evaluated using confusion matrices and Kappa statistics, with overall accuracies of 84.33%, 85.66%, and 87.00% for 2003, 2013, and 2023 respectively. The results indicate a marked decline in vegetation (−20.74 sq. km) and agricultural land (−6.40 sq. km), alongside a substantial increase in built-up area (+16.62 sq. km) and a net increase in water bodies (+10.51 sq. km). These changes are primarily driven by phumdi clearance, expansion of settlements, and fish farming activities, reflecting growing anthropogenic pressure on the Loktak Lake ecosystem.