ANALYSIS OF SUSCEPTIBILITY TO DESERTIFICATION IN CAATINGA ENVIRONMENT

Abstract

Environmental susceptibility indicates the probability of natural fragility concerning certain environmental issues, such as those related to desertification. The aim of this study was to identify areas susceptible to desertification in caatinga environments, based on the analysis of Canudos and Jeremoabo, both located in the northern area of Bahia. Fuzzy logic was applied in order to integrate the physical-environmental data (lithology, soils, and relief variables) and elaborate the susceptibility modeling. The topographic indexes of humidity, declivity, plane and profile of the relief curvature were obtained from the digital elevation model (DEM) and assembled the relief variable. After the composition and analysis of the environmental scenario, we observed that 13% of the studied territory corresponds to severe susceptibility and 15% corresponds to high susceptibility. Besides, we verified that both areas located in undulated relief, heavily undulated relief and mountainous relief and are in environments of medium-low and low topographic humidity index. In the cities we investigated, an average susceptibility stands out, which is higher than 40%. The data derived from the modeling shows the need to carry out an effective soil use in order to avoid or reduce environmental degradation processes of the caatinga biome, such as conservation practices to avoid actions that produce accelerated erosion, element of the desertification process.