A Set of Landscape Indicators to Describe Environmental Impacts of Crop-Shelter Coverage

In territorial areas characterized by intensive agriculture, protected cultivation may be a main source of income that leads to a rapid increase in crop shelter coverage. It is widely recognized that this type of cultivation constitutes an anthropic load that, together with other kinds of load (e.g. road networks, and urban and rural buildings) contribute to modification of the environment. The environmental effects caused by the spreading of crop shelters can be analyzed using causal chain frameworks. In these frameworks the forces acting on the environment, the changes that, as a consequence, take place and the social reaction to these changes are identified and described by suitable indicators. In this study, some landscape indicators were proposed and quantified within Driving force-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework with the aim of computing an index that describes the changes over time in soil coverage due to crop shelters. Taking into account both the level of crop shelter coverage and its time modification, the index constitutes a basic knowledge for local authorities to deal with problems related to the reduction of the environmental impact. The methodology proposed for the definition of the index made use of multitemporal analysis of remote sensing images, GIS analysis and contents of territorial planning tools. The methodology was applied to a region highly representative of protected cultivation activity located in south-eastern Sicily (Italy) and characterized by a lack of specific regulations regarding the building of such constructions. The results produce thematic maps of the indicators and index values in the different zones of the study area.