ANP Application in Evaluating Ecological Capability of Range Management (Case Study: Badreh Region, Ilam Province)

Abstract. Rangelands are important for plant productivity, livestock production, wildlife, conservation of soil and water resources, and etc. One of the main problem of rangeland is that has not been used based on its potential that leads to more degradation of rangelands. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the range management capability of Badreh region in Ilam province, Iran, using ANP (Analytic Network Process) and GIS (Geographic Information Systems) techniques. For this regard, firstly, the network of effective factors in evaluation was designed. Four clusters including vegetation cover, topography, pedology, and geology were divided into number of sub-criteria. For determining the relations among these clusters and sub-criteria, a number of questionnaires distributed among the experts and used to obtain their judgments about the relative importance of each criterion in rangeland capability. In the next step, based on the limited super matrixes the final weight of nodes was calculated. The weights of nodes in evaluating process were extracted by calculating the geometric mean of the questionnaire weights, as well. After determining the weights of nodes, they were transformed to data layers. Finally, ecological capability map for range management was provided using WLC (Weight Linear Combination) technique in GIS. The results showed that 3.00, 21.76, 58.46, 16.79 percent of the study area had very good (or excellent) condition (as first class), good condition (second class), fair condition (third class), and poor condition (fourth class) for capability of range management, respectively.