Multi-criteria land assessment for determination of rice growing suitability sites

Land suitability analysis is a prerequisite to achieving optimum utilization of the available land resources. Lack of knowledge on best combination of factors that suit production of rice has contributed to the low production. The aim of this study were to determine the most suitable areas for rice crop (Oryza sativa) based on some physic-chemical properties of various soils formed on alluvial deposits carried by the Terme River on the ？ar？amba Plain in the Central Black Sea Region of Turkey. For that reason, firstly land use-land cover, topographic and soil characteristics were determined in 53.6 km2 mostly flat land which was sized about 19 km length which is between Black Sea and at the beginning of mountain and 2.5 km width in both sides of Terme River that located on sought part of ？ar？amba Plain. To overcome the management and analysis of large volumes of spatial data for land suitability in this study, the geographic information system, geostatistic techniques and multi-criteria assessment using analytical hierarchy approaches were used to solve complex geographical problems and to reach reliable results for rice cultivation. According to results, it was determined that 69% of the study area has highly (S1) and moderately (S2) suitable whereas, 20 of it has not suitable for rice cultivation. In addition, 603 ha of the study area has marginally suitable coded as S3 for rice cultivation