Estimation of annual rate and spatial distribution of soil erosion in the Jamuna basin using RUSLE model: A geospatial approach

Soil erosion poses a serious threat to the western Jamuna sub-basin area in Bangladesh, comprising of 8 districts and 202 unions. The Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) methodology integrated with Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) was applied to compute the annual soil erosion rate for the western Jamuna sub-basin area. Primarily open-source data was utilized in this study to propose a low-cost and rapid soil erosion monitoring framework. Results indicate that a total of 598,232 tons of soil is being lost annually from the study area. Furthermore, the study estimates a potential average soil erosion rate of approximately 29.5 tons/ha/year in the 202 unions. The spatial distribution of soil erosion suggests that the unions of Bogra, Sirajganj…