TITLE:
Predicting Cork Oak Suitability in Maâmora Forest Using Random Forest Algorithm
AUTHORS:
Said Lahssini, Hicham Lahlaoi, Hicham Mharzi Alaoui, El Aid Hlal, Martino Bagaram, Quentin Ponette
KEYWORDS:
Cork Oak, Maâmora, Habitat Suitability, Random Forest, GIS
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Geographic Information System,
Vol.7 No.2,
April
20,
2015
ABSTRACT: Maamora is considered the
most important cork-oak forest in the world with regard to surface. Therefore,
anthropic pressure, including cork harvesting, grazing and soft acorn picking
up by local communities, has harmful consequences on forest regeneration and
the forest become older exceeding harvesting age. Thus, its sustainability
depends on the managers’ ability to succeed cork oak plantations. This work
presents an assessment approach to evaluate Quercus
suber suitability to its
plantation which is based on a random forest algorithm (RF). In fact, this
suitability has been assessed through analyzing management data related to
previous plantation success rates (SR). Then a relationship between SR and a
set of environmental and social factors has been investigated using the RF.
Application of the fitted model to continuous maps of all involved factors
enabled establishment of suitability maps which would help managers to make
more rational decisions in terms of cork oak regeneration, ensuring Maamora
forest sustainability.