Evaluation of the Impacts of Land Use Land Cover Change on Hydrology—A Case Study of the Nashe Watershed

Changes in land use and land cover (LULC) have a significant impact on a watershed’s hydrological processes. Investigating the impact of land use land cover change on hydrological components and the responses of watersheds to environmental changes is crucial for water resource planning, land resource utilization, and maintaining hydrological balances. The impacts of land use land cover on hydrological parameters in the Nashe watershed, Blue Nile River Basin, are explored in this study. Historical and future land use land cover change scenarios that represent baseline, current and future periods have been implemented into a calibrated Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model using Digital Elevation Model (DEM), land use land cover maps, soil data, weather data, and hydrological data. The result showed the land use land cover changes analyzed for the time period of 2019 to 2035 reveal a decline in ground water flow, lateral flow, evapotranspiration, and increment of surface runoff, and water yield. This depicts that the land use land cover change will occur in the future by decreasing forest land and increasing agricultural land and urban area that will increase the vulnerability of the watershed.