Assessing Land Use and Land Cover Change and Its Correlation with Air Pollutants in Kabul City

Land use transformations have substantially altered the natural environment in which humans live and in urban areas, the declining air quality poses a large threat to human health. To investigate the relationship between land use, land cover change and air pollutants, a non-segregated approach was used in combining remote sensing techniques with Geographical Information System. The land use and land cover in this study were categorized into the following; Water Bodies, Bare Land, Vegetations and Built-up area. The pollutants considered are; PM2.5, SO2, NO2 and CO. The annual average for 2021 was observed to be 47.46 mug/m3 which exceeded the threshold value of EPA 15mug/m3. Understanding the effect of pollutants on land use and land cover using Pearson correlation, it was observed that PM2.5 had a negative correlation of (-0.921) on water. Results also indicated that SO2 had a positive correlation (0.91) with vegetation, while CO indicated a positive correlation of (0.31) on bare land. In addition, NO2 had a negative correlation of (-0.62) on built-up area, and a positive correlation on Bare land. Analysis indicated an increase of (0.86%) in vegetation and (66%) in built-up area. While registering a simultaneous decrease of (39.9%) in water bodies and (15%) in bare land from 2001 to 2021. The findings from this observation constitute and suggest a valuable benefit of knowledge of regulations aimed at improving, safeguarding, and monitoring air quality. These outcomes may be used to inform land-use in making planning decisions in a comprehensive way and will be an empirical tool for LUCC rationalization and control strategies.