ABSTRACT
A fundamental approach toward assessing land quality is to document the area of land of a given land cover or use type (grazing land, cropland, forestland, etc.) affected by degradative processes that are outside of the normal range of variation or are out of balance with ameliorative process. This geospatial approach is consistent with concepts in the Santiago Agreement, which established criteria and indicators for sustainability of the world’s forest resources (Coulombe, 1995). Many of the criteria and indicators developed for use under the Santiago Agreement are area based (i.e., absolute area or the percentage of forestland affected by process or agents beyond the range of historic variation, such as excessive erosion) (Coulombe, 1995). A fundamental geospatial approach to land degradation assessment is also proposed by Dumanski (1997) in establishing a series of five “land quality indicators,” three of which specifically incorporate the areal extent or pattern of land conditions: land use intensity, land use diversity over the landscape, and extent, duration, and timing of vegetative cover on the land.
