RESULTS

NDVI Results

Areas that are more green represent healthier vegetation, while areas that are more red represent vegetation loss or damage.

NDVI from the Wet Season

From visually looking at these two maps, there appears to be a general improvement in vegetation health from January 1978 to January 2020. This is very noticeable along the western side of our study area, as the 2020 image consists of more green pixels. The center of the study area has also improved in vegetation health, as evident by the lack of bright red pixels in the 2020 image as opposed to the 1978 image. However, there is also visible decline in vegetation health noticed along the northern and eastern parts of the study area. There are more spots of orange and red pixels in these areas in the 2020 image in comparison with the 1978 image.

NDVI from the Dry Season

In comparison to the wet season images, there appears to be a general decline in vegetation health from October 1977 to October 2020. Our October 2020 image has significant cloud cover along the southwestern part of the image, making it appear as though vegetation health has declined in this area. However, the cloud coverage makes this conclusion weak, since the clouds could have interfered with the NDVI analysis. Nonetheless, declines in vegetation health are visually noticeable in parts of the study area not obscured by clouds. In general, there are more dark red pixels in the 2020 image than in the 1977 image, indicating that parts of our study area have decreased in vegetation health. There are also more areas covered by yellow and orange pixels in the 2020 image, which also shows how vegetation health has declined. These areas are noticeable in the northwestern, northeastern, western, and eastern parts of our study area.