LAND-COVER MAPPING IN A TROPICAL HILLSIDES ENVIRONMENT - A CASE-STUDYIN THE CAUCA REGION OF COLOMBIA

Results are presented from a study of land cover mapping undertaken in a tropical hillsides environment. The study area is located in the fo othills of the Cordillera Central of Colombia, where a conventional ma ximum likelihood classification was performed upon Landsat TM imagery. A comprehensive accuracy assessment procedure performed on the result ant land cover map suggested that relatively low rates of classificati on accuracy were achieved. However, reported accuracy levels were foun d to vary substantially, depending on the specific methodology used to generate them. This suggests that caution is needed when making compa risons between classification accuracy figures reported by different w orkers, unless their methodologies are also clearly identified. It is further argued that a low accuracy land cover map still makes a valuab le contribution to our knowledge of this hitherto little studied envir onment, provided that its limitations are understood and respected.