Land change science

Lore & Background

Land change science is a recently developed field that emerged alongside climate change and global environmental change research. In the mid-20th century, human-environment relationships were emerging in areas such as anthropology and geography. Some scholars assert the discipline is loosely derived from German concepts of landscape as the total amount of things within a given territory. In the latter half of the 20th century, scientists studying cultural ecology and risk-assessment ecology worked to develop land change science as a means of addressing land as a human-environment system.

Reader's Guide

Land change science is significant as a foundational discipline for understanding global environmental change. It addresses land use as a coupled human-environment system, helping to understand interconnected issues like deforestation and urbanization. The field relies on synthesis of diverse data and methods, including land cover monitoring, modeling risk and vulnerability, and land change modeling. Its scientific knowledge influences sustainable agriculture and land use policies. However, the field faces challenges including constraints on data, lack of understanding of underlying issues, and difficulty synthesizing case studies of social-environmental systems on a global scale. Spatial models are often limited to short-term projections due to lack of public data, faulty sensors, and high variable uncertainty. Despite these setbacks, land change science remains fundamentally interdisciplinary, including social and economic components, and is inherently sustainability research.

Did You Know?

• Land change science emerged in conjunction with the advancement of climate change and global environmental change research.
• Some scholars assert the discipline is loosely derived from German concepts of landscape as the total amount of things within a given territory.
• Land change science addresses land use as a coupled human-environment system to understand deforestation and urbanization.
• The field faces challenges including lack of access to public data on land change and high levels of variable uncertainty.