C O M P A C T G U I D E S

LUCASTHE EU’S LAND USE AND LAND COVER SURVEY

2017 edition

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LUCAS Survey — land use and land cover across the European Union:Monitoring socio-environmental challenges, such as: land take, soil degradation and environmental impact of agriculture.

Land use: SOCIO-ECONOMIC USAGE MADE OF LAND

LUCAS: 76 subclasses

Land cover:BIOPHYSICAL COVERAGE OF LAND

Artificial land Cropland

Woodland Shrubland

Grassland Bare land

Water areas Wetlands

LUCAS: 33 subclasses

Primary sector:

(for example, agriculture and forestry)

Secondary sector

(industry)

Tertiary sector

(services)

Other uses

(for example, residential use and abandoned areas)

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

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Pixabay

Pixabay

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

LUCAS Survey 2015: Field work• 28 countries;

• over 270 000 points;

• over 26 000 soil points;

• 750 surveyors;

• March – September 2015.

Soil sample

Point distribution

LUCAS Survey:• On-site data collection

• Land use / land cover

• Environmental information

• EU-wide

• Standard survey methodology:

Two phase sampling, classifications, data collection processes.

• Adapted to policy needs:

Flexible, ad-hoc modules .

• Reduced statistical burden:

No questionnaires for farmers, land owners.

Information collected:

• Current land cover and land use;

• Environmental information (e.g. irrigation, grazing, burned areas);

• Photos (e.g. landscape, crop);

• Topsoil sample;

• Grassland survey.

LUCAS point and pictures to the north, south, east and west

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© European Union LUCAS

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LUCAS Survey 2015: Results

Land cover in the EU-28 (% of total surface area in 2015)

Share of artificial land in total land cover, 2015 (% of total)

Source: Eurostat (online data code: lan_lcv_ovw)

Source: Eurostat (online data code: lan_lcv_art)

Artificial land

Cropland

Woodland

Shrubland

Grassland

Water areas

Wetlands

Bare land

3.01.7 3.3 4.2

22.2

37.8

7.1

20.7

0 5 10 15 20 25

MT

NL

BE

LU

DE

IT

DK

UK

PT

FR

CY

CZ

AT

EU-28

HU

IE

HR

PL

SI

ES

EL

SK

LT

RO

EE

BG

LV

FI

SE

Built-up area

Non built-up area

Ground document

Field form (extract)

Land Use/Cover Area Frame Statistical Survey 2015

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9 Latitud ___,____________ º 12 Altitud _________ m 14 Distancia _____ m

5/6 Longitud |_| W/E ___,_____________ º

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SEVILLA

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Región Biogeográfica:MED

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56

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Land cover and land use

10% 25% 50% 75% 90%

17 Direction: 1 on the point 2 north 3 east 8 N.R.

18

Radius: 1 1.5 m 2 20 m 8 N.R.

19

Plot area (in ha): 1 area < 0.5 2 0.5 ≤ area < 1 3 1 ≤ area < 10 4 area ≥ 10 8 N.R.

20 LC1: 23 LC2: 29 LU1: 32 LU2:

21 LC1 plant species: 24 LC2 plant species:

30 LU1 land use type:

33 LU2 land use type:

22

Percentage of land coverage (%) LC1: 1 %LC1 < 5 2 5 ≤ %LC1 < 10 3 10 ≤ %LC1 < 25 4 25 ≤ %LC1 < 50 5 50 ≤ %LC1 < 75 6 75 ≤ %LC1 < 90 7 %LC1 ≥ 90 8 N.R.

25

Percentage of land coverage (%) LC2: 1 %LC2 < 5 2 5 ≤ %LC2 < 10 3 10 ≤ %LC2 < 25 4 25 ≤ %LC2 < 50 5 50 ≤ %LC2 < 75 6 75 ≤ %LC2 < 90 7 %LC2 ≥ 90 8 N.R.

31

Percentage of land use (%) LU1: 1 %LU1 < 5 2 5 ≤ %LU1 < 10 3 10 ≤ %LU1 < 25 4 25 ≤ %LU1 < 50 5 50 ≤ %LU1 < 75 6 75 ≤ %LU1 < 90 7 %LU1 ≥ 90 8 N.R.

34

Percentage of land use (%) LU2: 1 %LU2 < 5 2 5 ≤ %LU2 < 10 3 10 ≤ %LU2 < 25 4 25 ≤ %LU2 < 50 5 50 ≤ %LU2 < 75 6 75 ≤ %LU2 < 90 7 %LU2 ≥ 90 8 N.R.

If LC CXX, or D10 or E10 & area size ≥ 0.5 ha If height of trees at maturity above 5 m

26

Height of trees at the moment of survey

1 < 5 m

2 ≥ 5 m

8 N.R.

27

Height of trees at maturity

1 < 5 m

2 ≥ 5 m

8 N.R.

28

Width of feature:

1 < 20 m

2 ≥ 20 m

8 N.R.

35 Land management: 1 Visible signs of

grazing 2 No signs of grazing 8 N.R.

36 Special status: 1 Protected 2 Hunting 3 Protected and

Hunting 4 No special status 8 N.R.

37 Special remark on land cover/use: 1 Tilled and/or sowed 2 Harvested field 3 Clear cut 4 Burnt area 5 Fire break 6 Nursery 7 No Remark 8 N.R. 9 Temporarily dry (river bed / lake) 10 Temporarily flooded

Mapa Topográfico © Instituto Geográfico Nacional de España

Landscape and ecosystem servicesThe presence of grass verges, hedges, dry stone walls, ditches and other semi-natural linear elements is considered to be of fundamental importance to help promote biodiversity and habitats, providing ecosystem services such as pollination or pest control.

The LUCAS ‘transect’ provides information on the presence and evolution of such linear elements and allows to assess them at a regional level.

What is LUCAS used for?

Land, a limited resource

Man-made surfaces are an important source of water, soil and air pollution, and the soil sealing by these surfaces can impact upon the water balance, thereby increasing the risk and intensity of flooding. This process of ‘land take’ also reduces the area available for natural habitats and ecosystems, with the fragmentation of wildlife habitats being a major concern.

Land cover and land use data from LUCAS are used to monitor the increase of urban areas and the productivity of artificial areas (in relation to GDP). Both of these indicators are included in the resource efficiency scoreboard. This scoreboard has been designed to assess the progress towards a resource-efficient, low-carbon economy — one of the key objectives of the Europe 2020 strategy.

© European Union, Joint Research Centre, 2017Administrative boundaries: © EuroGeographics © UN-FAO © Turkstat

An example of land take between the 2009 and 2012 surveys

LUCAS Survey 2015 — NUTS 3 average number of linear elements per transect with agriculture as main land cover

LUCAS Use Cases — more information and further examples of how LUCAS is used can be found at:http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/lucas/publications/use-cases

© European Union LUCAS

© European Union LUCAS

Average no. of linearelements per transect

0.00 - 0.98

0.99 - 1.76

1.77 - 2.64

2.65 - 3.94

3.95 - 8.00

Policy areas:Data from LUCAS can be used to help analyse and contribute to the development of various EU policy areas:

Common Agricultural Policy

Integrating environmental concerns in the Common Agricultural Policy;

Soil thematic strategy

Protecting the soil, as detailed in the soil thematic strategy;

EU biodiversity strategy

Promoting biodiversity and conservation, through the EU’s biodiversity strategy;

Europe 2020

Encouraging the efficient use of resources for sustainable growth, as in the resource-efficient Europe initiative;

Copernicus

Land monitoring, spatial planning and resource management, as carried out by the Copernicus earth observation programme;

Climate change

Tackling climate change, through monitoring conducted by the European Environment Agency, as well as actions under the European climate change programme.

Soil, an essential element for agricultureSoil is a key agricultural resource and of prime interest to Common Agricultural Policy.

The LUCAS 2009 and 2015 exercises collected soil samples which allowed soil quality (organic carbon content) and other parameters such as soil texture, structure and permeability to be measured. These parameters contributed to the evaluation of soil erosion.

Agricultural landscape

© European Union, Joint Research centre (2014)

Soil erodibility in Europe

Background image: ESRI World Terrain Base

© European Union LUCAS

Soil Erodibility (K-Factor) for Europe

< 0.01

0.01 - 0.02

0.02 - 0.028

0.028 - 0.033

0.033 - 0.038

0.038 - 0.046

0.046 - 0.055

> 0.055

No data

K-factor(t ha h) / (ha MJ mm)

LUCAS Use Cases — more information and further examples of how LUCAS is used can be found at:http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/lucas/publications/use-cases

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Luxembourg, Publications Office of the European Union, 2017 © European Union

Reuse is authorised provided the source is acknowledged.

The reuse policy of European Commission documents is regulated by Decision 2011/833/EU (OJ L 330, 14.12.2011, p. 39).

For any use or reproduction of photos or other material that is not under the EU copyright, permission must be sought directly from the copyright holders.

Did you know?

• Approximately 15% of the EU’s territory is affected by moderate to high soil erosion.

• Main causes of soil erosion are: inappropriate agricultural practices, deforestation, over-grazing and construction activities.

• LUCAS soil data contributes to European erosion mapping (see LUCAS use cases).

• Annual increase of artificial land cover in the EU is 1.3% (LUCAS 2012-2015).

Additional information on LUCAS:LUCAS website:

http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/lucas/overview

PDF: ISBN 978-92-79-65362-9 doi:10.2785/550346Print: ISBN 978-92-79-65370-4 doi:10.2785/001102

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