Land use and land cover changes, as seen in the agricultural expansion areas in the Brazilian Legal Amazon, have as consequence several social, economic and environmental impacts. The understanding of these processes allows a better planning of public policies in order to monitor and map areas more susceptible to environmental problems. Hence, this work had as objective to analyze the land use/land cover changes dynamics in the Suiá-Miçu River Basin, located in the north part of Mato Grosso state, Brazil. The land use/land cover maps for each of the analyzed periods (1973, 1984 and 2005) were made using images from the MSS/Landsat-1, TM/Landsat-5 and the MODIS/Terra sensors. The results showed that until 1984, 13% of the natural vegetation of the watershed was deforested, while in 2005 the agricultural areas increased to around 40% of the study area. In that manner, the landscape changes observed along the last decades show the urgent need for studies in order to preserve the natural resources of the region.
Deforestation; Agricultural expansion; Remote sensing; Amazon
