GIS as an aid to soil surveys and land evaluation in Greece

Excerpt

Using computers—in particular geographic information systems (GIS)—to aid soil surveys and land evaluation is well established in the United States. Nichols and Bartelli, for example, were among the first to demonstrate the potential of computers in soil survey interpretation. Soon after, Jansen and Fenton described the use of computers to store and process soil information. In recent years the Natural Resources Conservation Service (formerly the Soil Conservation Service) has used GIS for storing, manipulating, and retrieving soil map information (Burrough et al.). There is increasing use in the United States of GIS as a means for interpreting land resource data (Bliss and Reybold).

In marked contrast to the United States, very little soil survey and land evaluation research—using computers or GIS—has been done in countries bordering the Mediterranean sea. Ferrari and Magaldi have published a methodology for land suitability assessment in the Mediterranean. Although GIS processing capabilities are not used in that study, computer plots illustrate land evaluation results for selected areas in Italy.

In Spain, De La Rosa, et al., developed a microcomputer-based land evaluation system called MicroLEIS, which is designed to be applicable throughout the Mediterranean region. Microleis is …