IMPACTS OF URBAN EXPANSION ON AGRICULTURAL LANDUSE AND FOOD PRODUCTION IN CALABAR AND ENVIRONS

Abstract

In many parts of the world, rural-urban migration has been acknowledged as the main cause of urban growth and, consequently, the genesis of negative effects of urbanization. However, in some of the developed countries, urban growth is as a result of rapid development, modernization and industrialization, and not agglomeration of people which usually results from rural-urban drift as is the case with most developing nations of the world. This study focuses on the assessment of the impacts of urban expansion on changes in agricultural land use and food production in the two Local governments in Calabar and environs. To achieve the aim of these studies, the specific objectives of the study are to identify the land use changes in the study area between 1986 and 2018, examine the rate of food production in the area, and analyse the effect of changing land use and its implication on food production. The study employed Landsat imageries (1986, 2003, and 2018), Food production data from the Cross River State Bureau of statistics (CRSBS) and population census data of Calabar formed key data requirements. Change detection analysis was used to compare the land use land cover changes of the study area. both descriptive and inferential statistics which includes Frequency Tables, Percentages, Bar charts, pie chart and other means of representation through Statistics Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) were used to describe the growth pattern, demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of the study area. The inferential statistics, regression analysis was used to determine the relationship between urban area and agricultural land and ANOVA used to test for the differences between the two variables. Land use transition indicates that Built-up and water body recorded increase of 8.8% and 1.5% respectively. While other Land use; agricultural land, Natural vegetation and Bare-soil recorded a decline of -3.8%, -8.9% and -7.4% respectively. The study shows no significant decline in food production with increasing population.