A Hybrid Method of Parametric-Factor Analysis in land suitability Studies for Thyme, Marjoram, and Barberry Production in Northeast of Iran

Abstract

Abstract Land evaluation is the process of predicting land use potential on the basis of its attributes. In the present study, the land suitability evaluation using hybrid method of parametric-factor analysis was investigated for Thyme, Marjoram, and Barberry Production in northeast of Iran. The multivariate statistical method of factor analysis (FA) by principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to assess the land suitability zonation for Thyme, Marjoram, and Barberry production in North Khorasan Province, NE Iran. We processed the extracted variables and obtained four limiting factors that account for about 90% of the total variance. The study area was classified into three land suitability classes: S1 (suitable), S2 (moderately suitable), and S3 (marginally suitable) for Thyme, Marjoram, and Barberry production. The land suitability zonation map revealed that: For Thyme production, 2.43% (621.64 km2) of the area was S1, 92.37% (23542.2 km2) was S2, and 5.20% (1321.97 km2) was S3. For Marjoram production, 78.84% (20091.11 km2) of the area was S2, and 21.16% (5394.7 km2) was S3. For Barberry production, 1.70% (433.48 km2) of the area was S1, 75.80% (19318.68 km2) was S2, and 22.50% (5733.66 km2) was S3. The preference values achieved by the TOPSIS model revealed that Thyme with 0.583 has the highest score followed by Marjoram and Barberry with 0.499 and 0.465, respectively, which corresponds with the estimated land suitability indices obtained by the Parametric-Factor analysis model for the above-mentioned plants in the study area.