Deforestation for agricultural expansion in SW Zambia and NE Namibia and the impacts on soil fertility, soil organic carbon- and nutrient levels

A Food securityRemote sensing techniques can assist in monitoring agricultural expansion over long periods, as they provide an objective, repetitive, and consistent perspective across large areas.As such, time series of satellite images (for instance the Landsat mission that started in 1984) may contribute detailed information on land use, land cover, and corresponding changes and help to evaluate the impacts of human-driven processes on the environment (DeFries et al., 2004; Wulder income (Pröpper et al., 2015).In these subsistence-farming systems, most farmers use little or no inputs of fertilizers or organic material, and crop yields strongly depend on the amounts of soil organic matter and soil nutrients.Farmers implement fallow periods when crop yields decline in order to restore soil fertility.Agricultural expansion is another way how farmers deal with declining yields or increasing food demand (Jayne et al.,