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Table 1 Studies of land use impact on water quality

From: Impact of land uses on water quality in Malaysia: a review

Author

Location/methods

Objectives

Results

Cheah and Hamid (2016)

Location: conducted around Kedah, Penang and Perak, Malaysia

Method: field measurement and lab analysis

To determine water quality of rivers under various land use activities

It was found that the rivers with industrial land use setting recorded the highest pollution level, followed by both plantation and all recreational rivers, while less disturbed rivers recorded the lowest level of pollution.

Yen et al. (2017)

Location: Pinang River, Keluang River, and Burung River, Malaysia

Method: field measurement and lab analysis

To investigate the interaction of land use and water quality

The results of this research show that water quality characteristics in Penang Island are strongly influenced by land use surrounding the rivers.

Hua (2017)

Location: Malacca River, Malaysia

Method: remote sensing and multivariate statistics

To understand land use cover changes in water quality detection

The results of the analyses indicated that Land Use Land Cover (LULC) changes have significant impacts of water quality in the study area.

Gorashi and Abdullah (2009)

Location: Gombak River and its watershed in Malaysia

Method: data generation method coupled with ANN approach

To identify a relationship between water quality and land use attributes

The results revealed that as activities increased throughout the watershed, the quality values of the WQI decreased accordingly. The results of the WQI predicted using the WQI-LA showed a continuous decrease in water quality.

Razali et al. (2018)

Location: Cameron Highlands, Malaysia

Method: a review

To briefly summarize the land use change, agriculture practices, agro-tourism, and agriculture policy and management toward water quality of the river system network in Cameron Highlands

Results from previous researchers have underlined that factors such as soil erosion, landslides, agricultural activities, urbanization, and unplanned developments associated with land use change have significantly influenced the quality of river water in mountainous areas.

Toriman et al. (2018)

Location: Nerus River, Terengganu, Malaysia

Method: GIS analysis

To evaluate the relationship between water quality and land use characteristics in the Nerus River basin

The relationship between land use and water quality shows that urbanization is a determinant of river water quality, followed by anthropogenic horticultural activities (rural areas) often located near rivers.

Nainar et al. (2017)

Location: in Sabah, Malaysia

Method: field measurements and statistical analysis

To assess the effects of different land uses on suspended sediment dynamics

The results show that in hilly terrain, even heavily logged rainforest is essential to preserve water quality and reduce erosion, while oil palm requires careful soil management, particularly runoff roads and ground cover.

Al Mamun et al. (2016)

Location: SG PUSU, Malaysia

Method: GIS and AutoCAD

To assess the impact of improper land use changes on flash flood and river system

It is found that due to rapid changes in the watershed, the hydrology and morphology of Pusu has changed dramatically.

Wan et al. (2015)

Location: Tanah Tinggi Lojing, Malaysia

Method: GIS and statistical analysis

To explore the relationship between land use planning and water quality changes

The results indicated that the development of land use activities in the Tanah Tinggi Lojing area has affected the water quality parameters in the area.

Rasul et al. (2015)

Location: Bertam Catchment, Cameron Highlands in Malaysia

Method: field measurement and lab analysis

To study the spatial variability of physicochemical parameters with reference to various anthropogenic activities

This study shows that water quality at stations around urban and agricultural areas is deteriorating.