Abstract:
Land suitability analysis is needed to preserve the quality of land for future generations and to
achieve optimum utilization of suitable land resources for sustainable agricultural production.
Th
e aim of this study is to identify land suitability areas for coffee cultivation using GIS and
remote sensing techniques in Kersa district. It covers a total area of the district of about
97,061ha. For this purpose, the study has used four criteria, and fifteen factors selected from
climatic, topographic, soil, land use, land cover, and accessibility were considered for coffee
cultivation suitability analysis.For the suitability analysis of coffee cultivation, four and fifteen
suitability criteria factors were considered, respectively. Soil data were downloaded from
/h
armonized-world-soil websites (pH, texture, depth, type, and drainage; climate data were
do
wnloaded from (rainfall, temperature, and humidity); and topographic data were obtained
from Aster SRTM/DEM (aspect, slope, and elevation); accessibility factors were obtained from
ethiogis-mapserver.org. (Road, water, and market); and land use and land cover. All of these
da
ta were stored in an ArcGIS environment, and the factor map was generated for land
suitability for coffee cultivation. The study used a multi-criteria evaluation approach by applying
a pairwise comparison matrix and weighted overlay analysis (WOA) to classify the study area
into five coffee cultivation-suitable classes. The results showed that 60.1% of the study area was
analyzed as highly suitable (S1), 37.8% of the study area was determined to be moderately
suitable (S2), and 2.1% of the study area was determined to be lowly suitable for coffee
cultivation. Hence, the suitability analysis that more land is available that is suitable for coffee
cultivation. This means that 97% of the study area highly suitable for coffee cultivation land,
while the remaining 3% of the total area is low suitable for coffee cultivation.The findings of this
study will be useful for decision-making, planning, and policy-making, to support coffee farmers,
investors, and local governments, to invest in those suitable areas for coffee cultivation to
maximize agricultural productivity, and for further studies.
