GIS-based approach for participatory decision making and land suitability assessment

The objective of this paper is to present a GIS-based multivariate application for land suitability assessment with a public participation base. The approach takes into account the issues and concerns of the stakeholders, and employs a multivariate statistical procedure for classifying land units into land suitability groups, according to sectoral interests. Sets of spatial algorithms are incorporated into a GIS database to identify such groups. A participatory planning workshop was carried out to define the set of environmental attributes that determine the land-use pattern, in conformity with the interests, objectives, and values of the stakeholders. The approach allows experts to interpret the information generated by the stakeholders under methodologically rigorous conditions, with a minimum of spatial data, and with relatively low cognitive processing level demanded to the representatives of socioeconomic sectors, interest groups, and authorities.