Multicriterial techniques for wetland identification using geospatial analyses: the case of the Mefou Basin, Centre Region, Cameroon

The rapid urbanisation and anthropisation of wetlands have caused the disappearance of the already fussy wetland boundaries of the Mefou Basin. This has made wetland identification very challenging. The diverse perceptions of stakeholders involved in wetlands management led us to main objective which was to multi-criteria approach for delineating wetlands of the Mefou basin. The specific objective was identifying wetland susceptible sites from topography, slope gradient, presence of water and vegetation. The weighted overlay method was used in a Geographic Information System-based environment to delimit the wetlands. The following data sets were used, the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission Digital Elevation Model, a multispectral Landsat 8 image of the 21/01/2022 and administrative shapefiles from the National Institute of Cartography. The layers were classified in order of importance following Windy and saaty (Wind and Saaty, Management Science 26:641–658, 1980) Saaty (Saaty, Springer, Berline Heidelberg., 1987). The topography, slope gradient, topographic wetness index and vegetation were attributed to the weights of 40, 27.5, 20, and 12.5%, respectively. The results showed that wetlands covered a surface area of 90.03 Km², constituting 11.20% of the total surface area of the Mefou basin (803.78 km²). Most wetlands of the urbanised northern section of the Mefou basin had been encroached on by human settlement contrary to the rural south, thereby raising the need for conservation. The results showed that the multi-criteria analysis is a good method for identifying wetlands. This result will guide the management of these wetlands and is recommended to ensure the wise use as required by the Ramsar Convention on wetlands.