MONITORING CHANGE DETECTION OF VEGETATION VULNERABILITY USING HOTSPOTS ANALYSIS

Because of the ever-shifting nature of the weather conditions, which are made even more difficult by the dynamic relationship between the environment and the vegetation, one of the most important aspects is the vegetation. Landsat satellite imagery, TM sensor for 2002 and 2012, and OLI-TIRS sensor for 2022 were used for vegetation vulnerability. The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) method and hotspots analysis method were used for image classification, and the land cover map was obtained in three different years. The results of the analysis have shown that during 20 years, the extremely vulnerable zone has increased by 0.53%, the very vulnerable zone by 12.04%, and the moderately vulnerable zone has increased by 2.27% in terms of total area, also decreasing the non-significant zone by 5.74%, and the moderately safe zone decreased by 5.42%. The very safe zone decreased during this period by 2.94%. The extreme safe zone decreased by 0.73% in terms of total. Based on the assessment and validation of zone classification data, the overall accuracy value shows that the vegetation vulnerability accuracy for 2022 was equal to 90%. Also, the kappa coefficient for the classification vegetation vulnerability map was equal to 0.88. The research using Landsat data concluded that there had been a reduction in the amount of land covered by thick vegetation, which resulted in widespread drought conditions in some portions of the study region (Babylon Governorate). This research has shown that using satellite images and GIS spatial analysis is very effective in identifying and evaluating the trend of vegetation vulnerability in the Babylon Governorate. These data and techniques can be used for various analytical purposes.