The Carta della Natura project - Guidelines for habitat mapping and assessment at 1: 50,000 scale
Manual describes the methodological approach of the Carta della Natura information system at the 1: 50,000 scale.
The first chapter give general concepts, the scientific criteria and the basic requirements of the Carta della Natura information system. The second chapter of the manual provides information on relationship between Carta della Natura information system and biodiversity: habitats and species are infact the most important themes considered in the assessment process. Survey and habitats mapping methods and tools are describes in Chapter 3: methodology was initially mostly based on the use of Landsat satellite images but over the years have been optimized through important integration with the use of high definition images and data from additional layers such as land use and vegetation maps.
Chapter 4 describes the calculation procedures for the biotopes evaluation process, which is conducted through the calculation of indicators allowing to estimate: Ecological Value, Ecological Sensitivity, Anthropogenic pressure and Environmental fragility.
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