30 Years Trend of Peatland Utilization in Riau Province Rudy Haryanto (a*), Suwondo (b), Juandi (c), Sofyan Husein Siregar (d)
a) Doctoral Program in Environmental Sciences, Riau University, Pekanbaru, Indonesia
*rudy.haryanto[at]staff.unri.ac.id
b) Center for Environmental Science Studies, Riau University, Pekanbaru, Indonesia
c) Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Riau University, Pekanbaru, Indonesia
d) Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences, Riau University, Pekanbaru, Indonesia
Abstract
Peatland as a type of wetland ecosystem that is easily damaged. Damage to peatlands is generally caused by various types of unmanaged land use. The linear increase in the number and needs of the population has actually triggered the conversion of peatlands every year. This study reveals facts in an exploratory descriptive manner on the trend of peatland use in Riau Province from 1990-2020. Determination of the type of land use is based on changes in the condition of the peatland cover derived from Landsat images. The analysis was carried out with a spatial approach with overlay techniques using geographic information system applications. The results of the analysis found that the area of forest cover on peatlands in Riau Province has experienced a very large decrease from 71.71% to 35.93%. The rate of decline in forest cover area to non-forest is around 59,311.65 ha/year. The use of peatlands for cultivation activities continued to increase over the previous 30 years, from 28.29% to 64.07%. The largest utilization came from plantation activities by 44.48%. This value is very large compared to other activities such as dry land agriculture, rice fields, open land, settlements, infrastructure, mining, swamps, scrub bushes, and transmigration. This shows that plantation activities have dominated the use of peatlands, even faster than the expansion of residential areas. So that the priority of efforts to protect and manage peatlands is largely determined by the success of sustainable plantation management.
Keywords: Land use, Peatland, Riau Province
Topic: Biodiversity, soil health and agricultural practices
