Declining Urban Greenery in Kano Metropolis, Nigeria

Urban development disturbs the ecological balance by increasing imperviousness of land and diminishing green cover. Over recent decades, researches have brought to light the importance of urban greenery and its role in sustaining the environment of cities and towns around the world. Urban growth in Kano metropolis has been quite significant over a few decades and activities have been enhanced towards intolerable limits, making proper management of the outcomes of such activities near impossible; resulting in degraded environments. This growth is attributed to several factors which include increase in population, rural-urban migration, unplanned settlements and increasing built-up areas. This continuous increase in urban population has put a lot of strain on existing infrastructure and natural environment. This study examined the relationship between changes in Land use land cover (LULC) and the implications on vegetation density in Kano metropolis. Data used were sourced from Landsat images for 1998, 2002, 2013 and 2018 from which the Built-Up Index (BUI) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) were extracted and the Correlation coefficient analysis was carried. Results of the correlation between NDVI and BUI for the periods of study show there is a strong negative linear relationship between vegetation density and building density indicating that there has been decreasing vegetation density with increasing building density. The study recommends that Urban Policies should be developed towards encouraging urban greening as well as enactment of strong laws to protect green areas.