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Land Use and Land Cover Change (LUCC)

The International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) has initiated the System for Analysis, Research and Training Programme (START) to enhance sound scientific undertaking of global change. The START programme has set out as its primary objective for 1993/1994 to initiate regional networks and to allow regions to respond to regional needs as well as to support IGBP global objectives.

The Southeast Asia Regional Committee for START (SARCS), one of the 12 planned regional networks initiated by IGBP, has set out a series of work programmes funded by Global Environmental Fund (GEF) and Administered by United Nation Development Programme. The underlying idea is that this programme will eventually generate wider relevant regional activities supported by funds from other sources to increase regional capability and capacity in administering global research.

One of the SARCS programmes is activities on Land Use and Land Cover Change (LUCC). The activities are intended to initiate regional co-operation and regional understanding of the processes in land use and land cover changes, both the driving forces and their impacts on global environment. It is further expected that the activities will also contribute to regional knowledge and serve as inputs for national policies of the participating countries as well as global level policies (SARCS Secretariat 1994).

The LUCC project has been built around four case studies in four countries: Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines and LUCC teams work closely with START to develop the project with comparable results to other regions. It is also to utilise the ICBP-IHDP framework for linking physical and social scientists from within the region and also with co-operation from resource expert within SARCS-SAP.

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