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3.2.2 Land Use Mapping 
Based on research results obtained from the first 
Project for Remote Sensing, in 1984 a land use map 
of Lam Dong province 1/250,000 was made by RSAD 
using Landsat images combined with ground data. 
Following that the land use of different geogra- 
phical regions such as the central plateau Tay 
Nguyen, northern mountainous provinces, coastal 
zone, as well as a great number of provinces and 
distrits in the country have been mapped on scale 
ranging from 1/500,000 to 1/50,000 using remotely 
sensed data such as Landsat, SPOT, Soyuz and air- 
photos. 
Today the technology for land use mapping using 
remote sensing is widely applied and has transfe- 
red to some user organizations in the country. 
By the end of 1990, the Project supported by Gover 
-nment for land use mapping for the entire country 
at a scale of 1/250,000 using high resolution sa- 
tellite data was carried out jointly by RSAD, RSDC 
General Department for Land Use Management, Insti- 
tute of Forest Planning and Institute of Agricul- 
tural Planning. This Project is expected to be 
completed in 1991. 
3.2.3 Forest Mapping 
Based on research results obtained from the first 
National Project for Remote Sensing, forest map- 
ping for the entire country was done. This inclu- 
ded forest cover estimation and forest classifica- 
tion at scale ranging from 1/250,000 to 1/500,000 
using remotely sensed data acquired in 1985,1987, 
and 1990. This was carried out by the Institute of 
Forest Planning in cooperation with RSAD. 
3.2.4 Soil Erosion Mapping 
  
In 1990 a soil erosion mapping project was carried 
out under the Remote Sensing Application Project 
supported by the National Centre for Scientific 
Research. The study on potential soil erosion and 
soil erosion hazard mapping was carried out by 
RSAD in cooperation with the Institute for Pedolo- 
gy and Fertilizer, Institute of Agricultural Plan- 
ning, Institute of Forest, Centre of Geography and 
Natural Resources, and Centre for Forest Data Pro- 
cessing. 
The study uses multi-level remote sensing informa- 
tion for producing several thematic maps needed 
for soil loss analysis using the Universal Soil 
Loss Equation of Wishmeier and Smith and for maps 
of potential soil erosion and soil hazard. The Geo 
—-Expert System for Soil Evaluation is a very impo- 
rtant part of this study. 
The first results obtained show that remote sen- 
sing combined with other data sources can provide 
unique and useful information to determine soil 
erosion risks at scales ranging between 1/50,000 
to 1/250,000. 
3.2.5 Flood Mapping 
Most of the major floods in the country in 1988 
were mapped in near real-time using Landsat data. 
Maps given to State goverments/user agencies, pro- 
vided necessary data such as flood affected areas 
and assessment of damage due to floods.The opera- 
tional mapping of floods has been carried out for 
the last four to five years using satellite remote 
sensing data. 
3.2.6 Ground Water Potential Zone Mapping 
About one-third of the provinces and cities in the 
11 
country have been mapped at 1/250,000 scale for 
ground water potential zones in framework of seve- 
ral projects supported by government/local user 
agencies. Several organizations including the Cen- 
tre of Geography and Natural Resources, the Insti- 
tute of Water Resources, the Ha noi College of Mi- 
ning and Goelogy and others are involved in this 
work. 
3.2.7 Coastal Management 
Information on coastal land use, coastal processes 
and sediment dynamics are vital for coastal mana- 
gement. Coastal environments are made very dynamic 
by human and marine activities, and hence require 
periodic monitoring. In view of this, a study was 
done on the application of multitemporal satellite 
data covering the entire coastal zone. Resulting 
were land use, shoreline change and turbidity/sus- 
pended sediment distribution maps at the scale of 
1/250,000. This work was done jointly by RSAD,Sta- 
te Department for Geodegy and Cartography, General 
Department for Land Use Management, Remote Sensing 
Data Centre,Centre for Sea and River Dynamics and 
Institute of Oceanography. This has been done in 
the framework of the National Scientific Programme 
for Marine and Coastal Research coded 48-B. 
3.2.8 Integrated Assessment of Natural Resource 
and Natural Conditions for Planning Deve- 
lopment 
  
  
The limitation of conventional methods used for 
integrated assessment of natural resources and na- 
tural conditions are several : 
- Multiplicity of agencies generating similar 
but incompitible data sets. 
- No regular procedures for periodically upda- 
ting the data. 
— Practices of storing data are not amenable to 
efficient retrieval. 
The advantages of remote sensing data, such as sy- 
noptic view and repetitive coverage, help overcome 
these limitations. It is not surprising, therefore 
that some integrated studies for development plan- 
ning at the district level have been done using 
high resolution satellite and airborne data combi- 
ned with other information.Many scientists from 
RSAD, Centre of Geography and Natural Resources, 
Institute of Agricultural Planning, Institute of 
Forest Planning, Institute of Pedology and Ferti- 
lized, General Department for Land Use Management 
were involved in these studies. 
In 1989, under the Project RAS/86/141 supported by 
Regional Remote Sensing Programme RRSP/ESCAP the 
similar study on " Analysis of Remote Sensing Data 
for Assessment of Natural Conditions and Natural 
Resources and Their Dynamic on Some Coastal Zones 
for Inventory and Economic Development and for En- 
vironment " was done jointly by RSAD, Centre of 
Geography and Natural Resources, and the Institute 
of Physics. 
The obtained results such as methodology of integ- 
rated assessment using remotely sensed data, the- 
matic mapping by remote sensing technique for coa- 
stal zone, etc. have been presented and assessed 
on Regional Seminar on " Application of Remote Se- 
sing Techniques to Coastal Studies and Environmen- 
tal Monitoring " held in Ha noi from 12 to 15 Sep- 
tember 1989. The Seminar was organized by RRSP/ 
ESCAP in cooperation with National Committee for 
Space Research and Application of Vietnam.