A decade process of coastal land use changes in Peukan Bada-Aceh after the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami

Sudden environmental changes due to the impacts of the 2004 tsunami demolished a vast area of land around Peukan Bada of Aceh Besar. There were paddy fields and ponds as major livelihoods supports for coastal communities around this area. However, the tsunami waves demolished all the paddy fields and ponds around this sub-district. Since the 2004, a number of interventions were made to recovery the paddy fields and ponds. This study was aimed at monitoring the land use changes, in term of paddy fields and ponds, during 12-year of recovery process. Geographic Information System tools were used to map every 100 meter of interval in this area to observe the recovery process of the two land use types. After 12-year of the recovery process, total areas successfully being recovered in Peukan Bada were about 80% and only 19% for paddy fields and ponds, respectively. Some reasons were behind these changes. Two of the most frequent reasons are the changes of job types of the residents and the low productivity of the tsunami affected ponds/paddy fields.