Assessment of Population Growth on Vegetation Cover in Numan, Demsa and Lamurde Lgas Areas of Adamawa State

Abstract

This study examined the effects of population growth on vegetation exploitation in Numan, Demsa and Lamurde LGAs of Adamawa State. The primary data was obtained from the field through the used of structured questionnaire, while the secondary data includes satellite images Thematic Mapper (TM) of 1986, Enhance Thematic Mapper (ETM) of 2001 and Enhance Thematic Mapper Plus (+ETM) of 2017. Other secondary data include population data which was collected from National Population Commission Adamawa State. 383 household heads respondents were selected to represent the population, using a marginal error of 5%, and questionnaire was administered randomly to the household heads respondents. Descriptive and inferential statistics were the analytical tools used for the study, Linear and Exponential model were used to examine the pattern of change in population growth. Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI ) was used to distinguish healthy vegetation from nonvegetated areas. Results of the findings revealed that there was an increase of 28.8% in the past 12 years (2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014)(2015)(2016)(2017)(2018) in the population of the study area. The study shows that there is a long-term inverted Vshaped curve relationship between population growth and vegetation cover, which means that the vegetation cover tends to decrease gradually over time with the increase in population growth.