Abstract

• The study area Mong Hsat Township is situated in the Eastern Shan State, bounded on the north by Kyaing Tong Township, on the south by Thailand and on the east by Tachileik and west by Mong Tong townships. It lies between North Latitudes 20°5' 00" and 21° 43' 54", East Longitudes 99° 00' 00"and 99° 40' 00". Being on Shan massif, it has a lot of mountains and a few plains. In Mong Hsat Township, the classification of land use is based on GAD (General Administrative Department) and classified into four types of land use: Forest Area, Agricultural land, Built up Area,Water body and Bare lands. The proportional types of land use in the total area were comprised fallow land 71.33% followed by forest area 19.27%, agriculture land 9.2% and built up area 0.2% respectively. This data are not changed for a long time. In the study area changes of land use and land cover types are studied for 2000 and 2020 based on Landsat 7 and Landsat 8. By studying the changes of LULC between 2000 and 2020, forest area was decreased whereas the other LULC types such as settlement or Built up area, agriculture, water body and bare land were apparently seen the increased direction within twenty years period. In the overall changes, forest area was decreased from 2753.37 sq.km in 2000 to 1688.43 sq.km in 2020. The other areas of LULC changes were increased: agriculture from 361.83 sq.km to 945.36 km, settlement from 125.52 sq.km to 274.95 sq.km, bare land from 96.97 to 374.72 sq.km and water body 13.94 sq.km to 95.77 sq.km Therefore, the application of GIS/RS methods are to best estimate the temporal and spatial changes of the land use and land cover from the standpoint of natural resources management. It indicates that the land use pattern of office data had not been markedly changed during the period from 2000 to 2020. But the land cover areas in GIS/RS method had been clearly changed on images.