DOI: 10.5176/2251-3353_GEOS14.44
Authors: Muhammad Sanaullah and Manzoor Ahmad Malik
Abstract: This paper encompasses the impact of land use intensity on water quality in selected districts of KPK, Pakistan. The Industrial, commercial and urban centers pose a high land use intensity which possibly can enhance the quality degrading aspect of water. Agricultural land use intensity indices (geographical area, reported area, cultivated area, irrigated area, cropped area, uncultivated area, culturable waste, forest area and the area not available for cultivation) are projected by numerical approach. A total of 255 water samples from the districts of Buner, Swat, Dir Lower, Dir Upper and Mardan were collected as of public tube wells, domestic tube wells, public works taps, hand pumps, open wells, springs and surface water resources. Water quality was studied regarding the bacterial content, color, odor, pH, electrical conductivity (EC), taste, turbidity, total dissolved solids (TDS), hardness and for the ionic concentrations (arsenic, bicarbonate, carbonate, chlorine, fluoride, iron, magnesium, nitrate, potassium, sodium and sulphate). Estimated safe sample and land use percentages are 30 and 91 for Buner, 15 and 54 for Swat, 04 and 98 for Dir Lower, 10 and 97.5 for Dir Upper and for Mardan 21 and 96.5 respectively. The investigations revealed a reverse relation between land use intensity and water quality of the project area. High cropping intensity (193{6e6090cdd558c53a8bc18225ef4499fead9160abd3419ad4f137e902b483c465}) and a large forest area (135 hectares) of Swat district may have caused a deviation from the established relationship.
Keywords: Water quality, Landscape Intensity Index, quality degrading
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