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State of the Art in Ethiopian Church Forests and Restoration Options pp 11–30Cite as

Understanding Land Use/Land Cover Dynamics in and Surrounding the Ethiopian Church Forests

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Abstract

A better understanding of the causes and consequences of complex changes of land use/land cover (LULC) in a given landscape call for global attention for scientific research. This chapter reviews the state-of-the-art of scientific knowledge on LULC dynamics within and in the surrounding areas of Ethiopian Church Forests (ECFs). We conducted the review using systematically selected articles on LULC changes associated with ECFs, with additional literature to contextualize the broad scope of our understanding of the changes. Our review highlights approaches used for change studies, overall LULC changes and underling reasons/drivers of changes. Our study demonstrated that remote sensing and ground inventory based approaches are essential tools for change detection within as well as in the surrounding areas of ECFs. We revealed a mix of forest cover changes within and the ECFs. For increasing trends in forest area, the existence of stone walls, exclosures, intense rehabilitation, and protection activities were mentioned as major drivers. Conversion to croplands, population pressure, livestock grazing, government policies, isolation, and small sizes were the most common drivers for declining trends of forest areas. Further research challenges, and opportunities within and surrounding the ECFs are outlined.

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Acknowledgments

This work was made possible through the church forest project entitled “Exploring Church Forests as ecosystem baseline for restoration concepts in the Ethiopian highlands” by the financial support of Bavarian State Chancellery (Bayerische Staatskanzlei), which is gratefully acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Forest Management, TUM School of Life Sciences Weihenstephan, Technical University of Munich, Hans-Carl-von-Carlowitz-Platz 2, 85354, Freising, Germany

    Mengistie Kindu, Thomas Schneider, Martin Döllerer & Thomas Knoke

  2. Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research, P.O. Box 2003, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

    Degefie Tibebe & Demeke Nigussie

  3. Department of Range and Forest Resources, Botswana University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Private Bag 0027, Gaborone, Botswana

    Demel Teketay

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  1. Mengistie Kindu
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  2. Degefie Tibebe
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  3. Demeke Nigussie
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  4. Thomas Schneider
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  6. Demel Teketay
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  7. Thomas Knoke
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Correspondence to Mengistie Kindu .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Technical University of Munich, Freising, Bayern, Germany

    Mengistie Kindu

  2. Technical University of Munich, Freising, Bayern, Germany

    Thomas Schneider

  3. Organization for Rehabilitation and Development, Bahir Dar, Ethiopia

    Alemayehu Wassie

  4. Unique Forestry and Land Use GmbH, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

    Mulugeta Lemenih

  5. Department of Range and Forest Resources, Botswana University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Gaborone, Botswana

    Demel Teketay

  6. Fachgebiet für Waldinventur und nachhaltige Nutzung, Technische Universität München, Freising, Bayern, Germany

    Thomas Knoke

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Kindu, M. et al. (2022). Understanding Land Use/Land Cover Dynamics in and Surrounding the Ethiopian Church Forests. In: Kindu, M., Schneider, T., Wassie, A., Lemenih, M., Teketay, D., Knoke, T. (eds) State of the Art in Ethiopian Church Forests and Restoration Options. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-86626-6_2

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