(Gis) to Identify Agro-climatic and Edaphic Conditions for Coffee Growth, Case Study

67 Pages·2014·11.33 MB·English

UNIVERSITY OF NAIROBI

DEPARTMENT OF GEOSPATIAL AND SPACE TECHNOLOGY

SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

USE OF GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM (G.I.S) TO IDENTIFY
AGRO-CLIMATIC AND EDAPHIC CONDITIONS
FOR COFFEE GROWTH,
CASE STUDY: REPUBLIC OF RWANDA

By
Claude MIGAMBI
F56/79947/2012

A RESEARCH PROJECT SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT FOR
THE DEGREE OF THE MASTER OF SCIENCE IN GEOGRAPHIC
INFORMATION SYSTEMS, IN THE UNIVERSITY OF NAIROBI

May, 2014

Declaration
I, Claude MIGAMBI, hereby declare that this research project is my original work. To the best
of my knowledge, the work presented here has not been presented for a degree in any other
Institution of Higher Learning.

Signature………………………………… Date.....…………………

Claude MIGAMBI

This project has been submitted for examination with my approval as university supervisor.

Signature..…………………………… Date .........……………

Mr. Peter WAKOLI

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DEDICATION

I dedicate this work to the LORD GOD almighty, my creator and giver of life.
Great is your powerful name. He covers me with his feathers and he shelters me with his wings.
His faithful promises are my armor and protection.
I dedicate it again to my family especially my wife and my two children, Michael and Shammy.

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Acknowledgements

First and foremost, i wish to thank the Almighty GOD for his love, abundant Grace and
provision that enable me to study without any interruptions. I thank him for giving me the
strength, Grace, Wisdom and knowledge to successfully complete my study.
My sincere gratitude goes to my supervisor Mr. Peter Wakoli for his professional guidance,
valuable advice and contributions that lead me to the successful pursuit of this project. I am so
much grateful for his reliability that enables me to consult with him severally to enhance the
quality of this research project.
I would also record sincere gratitude to Dr-Ing.D.N.Siriba for his various contributions in one
way or another to this work.
My greatest appreciation goes to my family especially my wife for the unconditional support and
responsibility she has taken during my absence period.
Finally, i would like to thank my country for the technical support i got through the NUR-GIS
and Remote sensing Centre.

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Abstract
The significance of geospatial technology to this project lies in the fact that agriculture is of
spatial nature. Agriculture and natural resources are essentially understood by a geographic
location. Spatial technology is an important lever in responding to changing market forces.
GIS is playing an increasing role in agriculture production throughout the world by helping
farmers expand production, reduce costs, and manage their land more efficiently and effectively.
Inconsistent practices such as coffee extension without matching the environmental conditions;
and the issue of land space referring to the population size contradict the maximization of land
use in Rwanda. The capability of GIS to visualize agricultural environments and workflows has
proved to be very beneficial to the formulation of accurate strategies. The powerful analytical
capabilities of the technology have been used to examine farm conditions, measure and monitor
the impacts of environmental factors including the suitability of growing.
A thorough understanding of the potential and shortcomings about coffee growth in Rwanda has
a positive significance for farmers especially those who are more interested in coffee crop
investment, to clearly identify the better direction and actions.
In order to find out suitable conditions of coffee growing areas in Rwanda, my research was
limited to the four most important agro-climatic and edaphic variables namely temperature,
rainfall, elevation and soil ph distributed in the whole Country.
Therefore, the coffee growing areas in the republic of Rwanda was assessed through literature
review, geospatial dataset such as administrative boundaries, environmental data, topographic
and hydrologic data; then Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Treats (SWOT) and Multi
criteria decision (MCD) Analysis has been developed.
The results of the project have identified the favourate environment of Arabica Coffee in some
areas of Rwanda; and therefore the policy should be established to encourage the right way of
coffee plantation settlement and avoid the wrong practices cited above.

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Table of contents

Declaration............................................................................................................................. i
Dedication..............................................................................................................................ii
Acknowledge....................................................................................................................... iii
Abstract................................................................................................................................ iv
Table of content................................................................................................................... v
List of Tables....................................................................................................................... vii
List of Figure........................................................................................................................ vii
List of Acronyms.................................................................................................................. ix
1.0: Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION.................................................................................. 1
1.1. Background....................................................................................................... 1
1.2. Problem Statement............................................................................................ 1
1.3. Objectives......................................................................................................... 2
1.3.1. General Objective.......................................................................... 2
1.3.2. Specific Objectives........................................................................ 2
1.4. Justification for the Study................................................................................. 2
1.5. Scope of Work................................................................................................. 2
2.0: Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW..................................................................... 3
2.1. Study Area Description..................................................................................... 3
2.2. Overview of the Agricultural sector and coffee production in Rwanda.......... 4
2.2.1. Overview of the Agricultural sector............................................................. 4
2.2.2. Coffee production in Rwanda....................................................................... 4
2.2.3. Motivation of growing coffee...................................................................... 6
2.3. Role of GIS in Area suitability analysis in Agriculture.................................. 6
2.4. Land suitability Analysis................................................................................. 8
2.4.1. Multi-criteria decision making..................................................................... 8
2.4.2. Spatial multi-criteria decision making......................................................... 9
2.4.3. Applying MCDA in GIS context............................................................... 9
2.4.4. Weighting factors........................................................................................... 11
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2.5. Environment (Site selection)........................................................................... 12
2.5.1. Elevation....................................................................................................... 12
2.5.2. Temperature.................................................................................................. 12
2.5.3. Rainfall......................................................................................................... 13
2.5.4. Soil type....................................................................................................... 13
2.6. Distribution of coffee trees by administrative entity........................................ 14
2.6.1. Distribution of coffee trees, plantations, average trees per plantation
and area occupied at the provincial level.................................................... 14
2.6.2. Distribution of coffee trees, plantations, average trees per plantation......... 17
2.6.2.1. Number of trees......................................................................................... 17
2.6.2.2. Plantations and average trees per plantation............................................. 22
2.6.2.3. Grouping of plantation into coffee estates................................................ 25
2.6.2.4. Distribution of coffee trees by category of age......................................... 27
3.0: Chapter 3: MATERIALS AND METHODS........................................................... 31
3.1. Techniques of data collection...................... ......................................................... 31
3.2. Analytical approach............................................................................................... 32
4.0: Chapter 4: RESULTS AND INTERPRETATION................................................. 34
4.1. SELECTION BY ATTRIBUTES....................................................................... 34
4.1.1: Elevation and Coffee growth......................................................................... 34
4.1.2: Temperature and Coffee growth.......................................................................... 36
4.1.3: Rainfall and Coffee growth................................................................................ 39
4.1.4: pH Soil and Coffee growth............................................................................. 42
4.2. OVERLAYING FEATURES BY INTERSECTION....................................... 45
4.2.1. Elevation and Temperature.................................................................................. 45
4.2.2. Elevation, Temperature and Rainfall.................................................................. 46
4.2.3. Elevation, Temperature, Rainfall and PH Soil.................................................... 47
5.0: Chapter 5: DICUSSION, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS........ 48
5.1. Discussion.............................................................................................................. 48
5.2. Conclusions............................................................................................................. 51
5.3. Recommendations................................................................................................... 52
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6.0: REFERENCES............................................................................................................ 53

List of Tables
Table 2.0: An example comparison scale............................................................................ 10
Table 2.1: Coffee trees distribution per Province................................................................. 14
Table 2.2: Coffee Shrubs in individual and grouped plantations.......................................... 15
Table 2.3: Age of coffee trees at Province level.................................................................. 16
Table 2.4: Coffee trees, plantations and Average per District.............................................. 20
Table 2.5: Districts ranking according to the number of coffee trees.................................. 21
Table 2.6: Districts ranking according to coffee plantations and average of trees per
Plantation................................................................................................................ 24
Table 2.7: Coffee trees in isolated plantations and grouped plantations per District........... 26
Table 2.8: Districts ranking according to percent of grouped coffee trees.......................... 26
Table 2.9: Coffee trees per age and per District................................................................... 27

List of Figures

Figure 2.1: Rwanda district Map.......................................................................................... 3
Figure 2.2: Distribution of coffee trees per Province.......................................................... 14
Figure 2.3: Distribution of coffee trees per District (Map)................................................. 19
Figure 2.4: Distribution of coffee trees per District............................................................ 22
Figure 2.5: Distribution of coffee plantations per District.................................................. 23
Figure 2.6: Average number of coffee trees per plantation per District............................. 24
Figure 2.7: Distribution of individual plantations and associated plantation per
District.............................................................................................................. 27
Figure 2.8: Distribution of coffee trees by age per District................................................ 29
Figure 3.1: Integration of MCE and GIS into Spatial MCDM............................................ 32
Figure 3.2: A cartographic model of using GIS to identify potential areas for
coffee growth................................................................................................... 33
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Figure 4.1: Rwanda digital elevation model………………………………………………. 34
Figure 4.2: Suitability of area by Elevation……………………………………………..… 35
Figure 4.3: Suitability classes by Elevation….………………………………………….… 36
Figure 4.4: Rwanda annual temperature distribution……………………………………... 37
Figure 4.5: Suitability of area by Temperature……………………………………………. 38
Figure 4.6: Suitability classes by Temperature………………………………………….… 39
Figure 4.7: Rwanda annual Rainfall distribution………………………………………….. 40
Figure 4.8: Suitability of area by Rainfall………………………………………………… 41
Figure 4.9: Suitability classes by Rainfall………………………………………………… 42
Figure 4.10: pH Soil distribution in Rwanda……………………………………………… 43
Figure 4.11: Suitability of area by pH Soil………………………………………………. 44
Figure 4.12: Suitability of area by Elevation and Temperature ………………………… 45
Figure 4.13: Suitability of area by Elevation, Temperature and Rainfall …..……………. 46
Figure 4.14: Suitability of area by Elevation, Temperature, Rainfall and PH Soil……….. 47

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