Monitoring Wetland Variations Surrounding Addis Ababa: Unveiling Changes through Landsat Data Analysis

Cities and towns in Ethiopia are expanding, often around water bodies and wetlands. A wetland is not only a water source but also offers many economic, social, and environmental benefits. These wetlands near urban areas face negative impacts from the growing sectors. The amount of solid and liquid waste produced by various sources is increasing in both volume and complexity. This study highlights the use of remote sensing and GIS methods to detect changes in wetlands around Addis Ababa. The area was classified into six categories, and accuracy was assessed by comparing classification results with ground truth using a confusion matrix. The overall accuracy was 95.58% for 1986 and 86% for 2019, with an average of 90.5%. The confusion matrix also reports the Kappa Coefficient, measuring classification accuracy, which was 0.8645 in 1986 and 0.82 in 2019. In 1986, about 52.66 km2 of land was classified as wetlands, decreasing to 17.03 km2 in 2019. The proportions of land cover types in both years, including built-up areas and other factors, have contributed to the loss of wetlands in and around the city. This calls for immediate and medium- to long-term restoration and management plans to help develop a smart city and promote a sustainable, climate-resilient green economy.