Conflict-driven rapid forest degradation in an urban riparian ecosystem
High-resolution satellite evidence from Sunut Reserved Forest, Sudan
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 22240228 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Abdalrahman Ahmed (0009-0000-0624-2615), Abubakr Osman, Kornél Czimber (0000-0002-3739-2461) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 26 |
| Pages | 101367 |
| Publication date | 2026-07-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Trees Forests and People (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2666-7193 • E-ISSN: 2666-7193 |
| Publisher | Elsevier BV (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.tfp.2026.101367 |
| OpenAlex | W7165669551 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 55 |
Armed conflict is increasingly recognized as a driver of rapid land degradation, particularly in regions where the breakdown of the governance accelerates unsustainable resource extraction. This study quantified conflict-associated forest degradation in the Sunut Reserved Forest, a riparian ecosystem in Khartoum, Sudan, following the escalation of armed conflict in 2023. Multi-temporal PlanetScope imagery from January 2023, 2024, 2025, and 2026 was analyzed to assess vegetation dynamics and land cover transitions. Vegetation dynamics were assessed using the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and land use/land cover (LULC) classification was performed using an object-based Support Vector Machine (SVM) algorithm. A total of 260–272 stratified random samples per year were used, with 70% allocated for training and 30% for independent validation. The classification performance was evaluated using confusion matrix–based metrics, yielding overall accuracies ranging from 82.09% to 94.10% and Kappa coefficients between 0.64 and 0.88. Forest cover declined from 105.34 ha (58.23%) in 2023 to 20.19 ha (11.16%) in 2026, representing 80.83% reduction over three years. Annual forest loss accelerated from −12.66 ha·yr−1 (2023–2024) to −36.25 ha·yr−1 (2024–2026), and sharply increased to −66.66 ha·yr−1 (≈ −76.75%·yr−1) between 2025 and 2026, indicating a non-linear degradation trajectory. NDVI correlations weakened substantially over time (τ = 0.69 for 2023–2024; τ = 0.20 for 2024–2026; p 0.80), and the uncertainty estimates were considerably smaller than the magnitude of the detected changes. Spatial evidence confirms that direct deforestation activities, rather than climatic stress, are the primary drivers. The near-complete removal of riparian forest cover implies severe degradation of hydrological regulation, soil stability, and biodiversity in urban floodplain settings. These findings demonstrate how conflict can trigger abrupt land system transitions and underscore the need for conflict-resilient land governance, rapid restoration interventions, and satellite-based monitoring frameworks to prevent long-term degradation and loss of ecosystem services.
Environmental degradation · Forest cover · Forest degradation · Riparian zone · Satellite · Vegetation (pathology) · Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management · Land Use and Ecosystem Services · Soil erosion and sediment transport
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| Highly cited | No |
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