Strategic selection of wood farming locations in semi-arid regions: An AHP-WLC approach for sustainable land management in northern Iran

Desertification, in addition to the spread of dust, will affect the livelihood of the people living in these areas and create widespread problems with the expansion of migration. The development of wood farming with fast-growing species suitable for arid and semi-arid regions, in addition to solving economic-social challenges, additionally solves the need for wood industries. Today, with the development of decision-making models, it has become possible to select a suitable location for establishing a species, emphasizing its nature and ecological needs. This research aims to identify the effective factors in wood farming with two species of River Red Gum (RRG) Eucalyptus camaldulensis Dehnh. and Athel Tamarisk (AT) Tamarix aphylla (L.) Karst) in Gonbad-e kavous, located in the semi-arid part of northern Iran, through the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) and the Weighted Linear Combination (WLC) method, and mapping the areas prone to planting these species, using the Arc GIS 10.8 and IDRISI TerrSet 2020 software. Therefore, 10 climatic and edaphic variables along with four variables of distance from a surface streams, distance from the road, depth of underground water, and land use of the region were extracted to identify land suitability. After receiving the opinions of the experts in prioritizing the effective factors, by digitizing and weighting the layers based on the existing standards, a database was formed and thematic maps were prepared. Based on the results, climatic factors placed the most weight on the final land suitability maps. Additionally, among the edaphic factors, Electrical Conductivity (EC) with 0.0809 and 0.0380 for RRG and AT, respectively, took the most weight. The resulting findings from the RRG planting potential map show that the neither suitable nor unsuitable class with an area of about 1620 square kilometers has the highest level and the very suitable class with less than 417 km² has the lowest level in the studied area. Although the possibility of wood farming with AT compared to the RRG, has occupied a higher level of study area, but still the high class with an area of less than 12% shows a small contribution. Overall, the map of the final potential of wood farming with both species has been demonstrated that the three classes of very unsuitable, unsuitable, and neither suitable nor unsuitable cover about 67% of the area, and the very suitable for wood farming also covers about 13% of the study area. The findings of the present research can provide decision-making managers with appropriate solutions for the development and implementation of wood farming programs.