Fig. 4: Spatial patterns of persistence and change in natural and human-dominated land cover.
From: Accelerating land cover change in West Africa over four decades as population pressure increased
a Map of eight possible trajectories of change and persistence, illustrated in an red-green-blue (RGB) composite where each primary color represents a binary layer (human-dominated = 1, natural = 0) at one time period: red is assigned to the 1975 period, green to the 2000 period, and blue to the 2013 period. The resultant trajectories are: black (BL)—persistent natural land cover, white (W)—persistent human-dominated land cover, blue (B)—transition from natural to human-dominated 2000–2013, cyan (C)—transition from natural to human-dominated 1975–2000, red (R)—transition from human-dominated to natural 1975–2000, yellow (Y)—transition from human-dominated to natural 2000–2013, magenta (M)—human-dominated to natural to human-dominated, green (G)—natural to human-dominated to natural. b Four subsets highlighting a range of different dynamics in selected locations: (i) old agricultural area with expansion and abandonment, (ii) recent large-scale commercial farming, (iii) shifting cultivation, (iv) agricultural land use modulated by topography. c Proportions of persistence and change trajectories along the rainfall gradient show steep increase in human-dominated land cover across the Sahel sub-region, fewest natural land cover from the Sudano-Sahelian through the northern Guinean sub-regions, and a predominance of recent transitions to human-dominated land cover in the recent (2000–2013) compared to the earlier (1975–2000) time interval.
