The study identified and analyzed land use patterns between 1960 and 2005, and examined the forces underlying land use change and projects the future pattern of land use change in the study area. Both primary and secondary data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics and geospatial techniques of GIS and Remote Sensing. The results showed that settlement land use which was 1253.12 hectares (3%) in 1972 increased by six fold to 7684.27 hectares (16%) in 1984 and by tenfold to 12842.11 hectares (27%) of the total land area in 2005. Farmlands reduced from 8751.21 hectares (19%) in 1972 to 7144.32 hectares (15%) in 1984 to 3824.80 (8%) in 2005. The result equally showed that between 1972 and 1984 the population grew by 75.16% while settlements increased by 513.21%. Also between 1972 and 2005 the population grew by 206.70 % and settlements increased by 924.81 %. The result of the predictive model developed for this study showed that settlement, bare surface, shrub and water body will increase by 60.30%, 57.68%, 53.79% and 8.03% respectively while non-forested, farmlands, forested wetlands and light forest will decrease by 9.5%, 28.55%, 12.35% and 26.76% respectively. There were continuous changes among the various land use classes identified.

Southwestern Nigeria's wetlands are assaulted, degraded, and lost, especially to agricultural development and urban expansions, while the rural wetlands losses are due to agriculture but temporal in nature, loss to urban developments are permanent. To examine the extent, influence, and potential of the degradation, the review covered the six states of the region, revealing losses due to wetlands destruction in the region between 1965 and 2019. Wetlands in Lagos reduced from 708.96ha (52.68%) in 1965 to 7.10ha (0.53%) in 2005, Eleyele Wetland in Oyo State, (Riparian), reduced consistently from (1.25 km2) in 1984 to (0.98 km2) 1994, (0.70 km2) 2004 and finally (0.42 km2) in 2014. Eriti forested wetlands of Ogun State lost about 45.32% between 1972 and 2015; in Ondo State, Akure South Local Government Area Wetlands decreased from 98.90 km2 (30.13%) in 1999 to 90.33 km2 in 2009 (27.52%); Ilesa wetlands, in Osun State decreased from 258 hectares to 89 hectares between 1986 and 2002. The above scenarios in the region imply that in a short while, the wetlands would be completely lost, most importantly to the uncontrolled urban developments. Therefore, there is an urgent need for all hands to be on deck to protect wetlands by considering them as endangered ecosystems.

Wetlands are significant to the environment and economic survival of people most especially in the rural areas of the tropical world; their sustainability is however threatened by agricultural drainages and demographic pressure. The detrimental influence of agricultural expansion on wetland loss was examined using both primary and secondary data. The primary data was collected through questionnaires administration and interviewing of hundred members of Fadama Users Group (FUG) (i.e. 10%). The secondary data included satellite images of 1972, 1984, 2000 and 2015 analyzed using GIS technique and corresponding census data by simple descriptive percentage method. The results revealed that marginal wetlands lost about; 3180.60 ha between 1972 and 1984, 1936.08 ha between 1984 and 2000 and 805.32 ha between 2000 and 2015, to farmlands intensification throughout the periods of study. Wetlands ecosystem was also expected to lose more ground as the population growth is unabated and, more so, with the projected farmlands growth of about 4730.04 ha i.e. about 36.36% in 2030; there is, therefore tendency for serious depletion of marginal wetlands in the future.