Comparative analysis of the preservation of watershed state protective forest strips of the Volgograd region according to Sentinel-2 NDVI data and information products of land cover types

Abstract

In this paper, an analysis of the preservation of watershed state protective forest strips (GZLP) on the territory of the Volgograd region was carried out. Three protective strips were analyzed: “Kamensk–Penza”, “Kamyshin–Volgograd”, “Volgograd–Cherkessk”. The data of remote sensing of the earth (remote sensing) from the Sentinel-2 satellite with a spatial resolution of 10 meters were used and the data obtained were compared with alternative open access sources on the state of the forest coverage of the territory: GlobalLandCover30 (GLC30), ESRI, Global Forest Change (GFC). Mapping of the research object was carried out in the geographic information system QGIS, the reason for the choice is the free usage and the availability of versatile modules for working with remote sensing data of the Earth. With the help of Sentinel-2 A-B RGB images and a public cadastral map, mapping of the project area of state protective forest strips was carried out, after which the forest canopy was classified using the normalized vegetation index NDVI for August-September. The areas of forest strips located on various soil-forming rocks are calculated on the basis of the soil map of the Volgograd region in 1984 M 1:400,000. The studied GZLP occupy an area of 13,094.1 hectares of 9 forest areas of the Volgograd region. The safety of the GZLP was determined as follows: the ratio of the area actually occupied by forest plantations to the projected area of the forest strip based on the classification of NDVI index images and information products of the types of land cover and projective forest cover. Data on the safety of state protective forest strips in the Volgograd region have also been prepared on the basis of official statistics. A comparison of four open access data sources on the coverage of state forest strips with forest plantations was carried out. The results obtained will serve as a basis for further assessment of the causes of the degradation of GZLP, including field studies on areas without forest cover identified using the above methods.