Effects of land use and land cover change on soil erosion in the Caatinga biome

Changes in the natural environment on a global scale due to transformed land use and land cover have reached the most critical point in history, putting pressure on important biomes and their biodiversity across the entire planet. The Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation Three-Dimensional (RUSLE3D) model was applied to the Seridó River Basin, fully inserted in the Caatinga biome, to identify the areas with the greatest soil loss due to changes in land use and cover over three decades (1988 to 2018). Land use and land cover data were provided by the MapBiomas Project (2023) and yearly selected based on total annual precipitation. The factors used in RUSLE3D were obtained through a literature review and processed using Python language and geoprocessing tools. In 2018, native vegetation showed a reduction of 15.12% in Forest and 42.71% in Non-Forest Natural Formation compared to the initial period. More than 35% of the area has undergone at least one change in use over the three decades, mainly due to the advance of Farming in forested areas. Despite the decrease in average soil loss over time, a clear association was observed between fluctuations in vegetation cover and the intensity of soil loss, highlighting the need to implement appropriate landscape management and practices to control erosion in Caatinga areas. The RUSLE3D model highlighted slopes as the regions with the most severe soil loss along with areas of exposed soil.