This vector dataset is a compilation of land use data for Western Australia, as at August 2018. It has been derived from various vector datasets with attribution relevant to land use in Western Australia. The date of mapping (2008 to 2018) and scale of mapping (1:5 000 to 1:250 000) vary, reflecting the source data, capture date and scale.
The data shows a single dominant land use for a given area, based on the primary management objective of the land manager. As a seamless spatial dataset for Western Australia, it can be used to identify, map and analyse high level land use categories (such as nature conservation, dryland cropping and irrigated horticulture) and more specific land use categories (such as aquaculture and tree fruits) including some commodities (such as bananas). These categories can be extracted or combined with other spatial datasets to provide new insights and analysis concerning land use in Western Australia.
Land use is classified according to the Australian Land Use and Management (ALUM) Classification version 8, a three-tiered hierarchical structure. There are five primary classes, identified in order of increasing levels of intervention or potential impact on the natural landscape. Water is included separately as a sixth primary class. Primary and secondary levels relate to the principal land use. Tertiary classes may include additional information on commodity groups, specific commodities, land management practices or vegetation information. The primary, secondary and tertiary codes work together to provide increasing levels of detail about the land use. Land may be subject to a number of concurrent land uses. For example, while the main management objective of a multiple-use production forest may be timber production, it may also provide conservation, recreation, grazing and water catchment land uses. In these cases, production forestry is commonly identified in the ALUM code as the prime land use.
The operational scales of the mapping vary according to the intensity of land use activities and landscape context. Scales range from 1:5 000 and 1:25 000 for irrigated and peri-urban areas, to 1:100 000 for broadacre cropping regions and 1:250 000 for the semi-arid and arid pastoral zone. The scale of mapping generally reflects the intensity of land use.
This update refreshes the entire state of Western Australia to ALUM v8.
