LANDCARE GIS -- AN INFORMATION SYSTEM FOR THE NATIONAL LANDCARE PROGRAM

摘要

The rate of growth of the landcare movement in Australia has been spectacular. In 1994 there were over 2200 community landcare groups and the Commonwealth Government had provided funding for over 3600 projects under the National Landcare Program (NLP)and related programs. The Bureau of Resource Sciences has developed a geographic information system, LANDCARE CIS, to provide information system support to the managers of the NLP, the Commonwealth Department of Primary Industries and Energy. LANDCAREGIS provides a mechanism for integrating and analysing a range of landcare-related datasets, including information on government-funded landcare programs, landcare groups, land condition, land management practices and other biophysical and socio-economicfactors. The system has been used to provide descriptions of NLP activities since the start of the Decade of Landcare in 1989, in a range of mapped, graphical and tabular formats. Other applications include analyses of the extent to which Commonwealth landcare programs are targeting areas with existing or potential land degradation problems, a comparison of management practices used by landcare and non-landcare farmers, and an analysis of farmers' perceptions of land degradation. Data characteristics which currently limit some LANDCARE GIS applications are discussed.