ANALYSIS OF DETERIORATION PROCESS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL MINERAL EXTRACTION KAOLIN IN EQUADOR-RN MUNICIPALITY.
Semi-arid, NDVI, Tasseled Cap, Environmental Perception
Areas that have high degradation in the soil cannot recover their chemical, physical nor biological characteristics, and may be considered desertification areas. Because of its climate, in Brazil, the semi-arid region is the one that is the most vulnerable to the effects of desertification, aggravated by various forms of land use and occupation. Mining is one of them, which while contributing economically in a region triggers a range of negative impacts to the environment. Amongst these impacts, we can highlight the loss of vegetation. Remote sensing techniques have been widely used to monitor changes in vegetation over time, providing useful clues about the changing environment and helping the management of natural resources. The city of Equador/RN is a kaolin mining site in the semiarid region, and this activity is responsible for most of the municipality's revenues. However, it triggers a range of negative impacts to the environment. We have questioned how the kaolin extraction culture in Equador-RN municipality is changing nature and the perception of the population towards mining activities. Therefore, in order to understand this process, we intended to make a diagnosis of the current environmental condition of the region under a study. The analysis of vegetation will be performed according to the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and the Tasseled Cap transformation. The perception of the population in relation to mining activities will be checked from the conceptual analysis of semi-structured questionnaires to be applied.