“METODOLOGIA DE ELABORAÇÃO DA CARTA DO POTENCIAL EROSIVO DA BACIA DO RIO DAS VELHAS (MG)”

Abstract

This paper concerns the methodology applied to the erosive potential analysis in the Rio da Velhashydrographic basin (Minas Gerais State, Brasil) along with the results obtained. This project aimed at theproduction of a digital map at a 1: 200 000 scale of the fragility of both natural and human-interferedenvironments in Rio das Velhas Basin. The adopted approach seeks to integrate the combined effects of aset of variables – relief, soil, climate and land use/land cover – to identify the environmental instability andto map the ecodynamic units. First, the cartographic variables were classified according to their degree ofenvironmental instability, these were later combined pair-wise and a set of decision rules was applied toproduce the final map. The results depicted well the major fragile areas in the basin, which should receivespecial care for their preservation. The developed methodology is easily implemented and flexible enoughto permit changing the decision rules to fit different criteria.