GIS-based landscape classification and mapping of European Russia

The landscape approach is widely recognised today as a powerful method of multidisciplinary environmental research. Integrating data both on natural geoecosystems and socio-economic impacts and their relationships, it offers an ideal frame of territorial sampling for evaluating, mapping and modelling environmental status and dynamics. This study is intended to compile a broad-scale environmental frame of European Russia, and to improve existing landscape classifications using GIS techniques. It also suggests a simple and efficient method of validation for broad-scale landscape maps by small-area ‘mapletsʹ generated from high-resolution remote sensing data.