On October 26, 1993 the Arkansas Water Resources and Wetlands Task Force was created. The overall purpose of the task force was to "preserve and protect Arkansas water resources." The task force identified geographic information systems (GIS) as a technology critical to the achievement of its goals and recognized that the rapid development of several digital data sets were necessary. In 1994 the state legislature assigned the task of creating these data sets to the Arkansas Soil and Water Conservation Commission (ASWCC). One digital data set deemed essential to the aims of the task force by the ASWCC was a map of agricultural land-use. The ASWCC determined that a baseline land-use/land-cover (LULC) map focusing on agricultural crops and centered on the year 1992 should be created. To further serve the goals of the task force, it was proposed that additional LULC maps be made be at five year intervals. As scheduled, the LULC mapping years would coincide with the years of the U.S. Census of Agriculture making this data set a valuable asset to various public and private organizations. The data derived from this project could, for example, greatly aid farmers in their efforts to comply with strict new farm bill regulations, or aid researchers working on the Boll Weevil Eradication Program.

In December 1996 the ASWCC funded a proposal submitted by the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies (CAST) at the University of Arkansas - Fayetteville. The proposal entitled "Development of a Digital land-use/land-cover Map for the Arkansas Delta" presented details on the development of enhanced digital land-use/land-cover maps focusing on agricultural crops for the twenty-seven Arkansas counties located within the Mississippi Alluvial Valley. The proposal stipulated that CAST would, with provided ASWCC funding, "Create a detailed, consistent land-use/land-cover map and a digital database for the 27 counties of the Delta." The database would include LULC maps derived from Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) satellite imagery for the counties of the Delta. The LULC maps would build upon, and substantially improve the existing but incomplete digital LULC maps already available. CAST personnel would produce three digital maps (season maps) for each county derived from satellite scenes acquired at three periods throughout the growing season: Spring, Summer, and Fall.

Nearly all of Arkansas's harvested acreage is devoted to six principal crops: soybeans, rice, cotton, wheat, sorghum, and corn. The vast majority of Arkansas' harvested cropland is found in the eastern third of the state in 27 contiguous counties oriented north-to-south along the Mississippi River. The study area covers 13 million acres (20,000 sq. miles), more than half of which is harvested cropland. The majority of this area is in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley (MAV), a physical division stretching from the confluence of the Mississippi River northward to the juncture of the Ohio River in Illinois. The soils of the MAV are very fertile and well suited to large-scale crop production. The Arkansas portion is mostly flat with the exception of the western portions of the northern project area where the foothills of the Ozark Plateaus and Quachita Province begin. Crowleys Ridge, a 3 to 10 mile wide north-to-south erosional remnant rises up to 50 meters above the MAV in Northeast Arkansas. Crowleys Ridge is composed of sediment from the Tertiary period and was formed by fluvial processes during the mid to late Quaternary period. The Ridge rises 100 to 200 feet above the fertile plains of Clay, Greene, Craighead, Poinsett, Cross, and St. Francis counties. Crowleys Ridge is dotted with forest, pasture, orchards, and residential areas. The Grand Prairie of Arkansas, though technically part of the MAV, is often differentiated from the MAV due to its unique soils, poor drainage, and very flat terrain. Historically, the Grand Prairie was used as pastureland. Today, these aglands are used predominately for rice and soybean production. The Grand Prairie of Arkansas is nationally recognized as a premier rice producing area. The southwestern portion of the project area is characterized by an expanse of temperate mixed evergreen forests comprising the West Gulf Coastal Plain.

(Pumping Groundwater for Irrigation)

ASWCC and other concerned entities hope to better understand the impact of heavy irrigation on underground water resources with the data generated from this project. Combining crop location information, for example, with data from well monitoring would result in more meaningful water use calculations. Combining the crops database with well locations and the soil series database, also under development, would indicate potential contamination of groundwater. With the information generated, appropriate water resources management plans can be formatted. An accurate crop location database would also be useful in large scale pest management projects. The boll weevil is responsible for $30 to $40 million in cotton crop damage annually. In the past boll weevil eradication programs focused on a general indiscriminate spraying of all cotton fields. The crops database would provide the necessary cotton field location information for a more localized application of pesticides. Costs to farmers, taxpayers, and the environment would go down as a result. Yet another application centers on combining the crops database with soils series and crop yield information. The resulting information could be used to highlight which soils generate the highest yields for specific crops. Farmers could, in turn, plant crops highly suited to underlying soils for increased production and yield. These are just a few examples of how the landuse/landcover data are likely to be used. There are certainly other benefits to the average citizen, local, county and state government.