APPLICATION OF THE INTEGRATION OF GIS - GROUP AHP - TOPSIS MODEL IN LAND SUITABILITY ANALYSIS FOR DRAGON FRUIT IN BINH THUAN PROVINCE, VIETNAM

Abstract

Land evaluation for sustainable land-use management (ESLM) have to take into accounts several different issues - such as natural, environmental and socioeconomic conditions – and thus it is multi-criteria decision analysis. This paper presents the results achieved in the integration Of GIS, AHP group and TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution) in solving ESLM problem. The integration process is as follows: i) Identify sustainability indicators using the FAO approach (1993b, 2007); ii) Calculating weight of each sustainability element by using AHP in group decision making; iii) Using GIS to build thematic layers corresponding to suitability elements and to combine layers; iv) Application of the TOPSIS method to calculate and to rank land suitability. This integration model is used to evaluate land in Dragon Fruit, Binh Thuan province, Vietnam. The results were compared with those obtained from land suitability assessment using the integration of GIS, group AHP, and Weighted Average Method (WAM), showing that TOPSIS demonstrates stronger discriminatory power than WAM.