With increasing demand land for agriculture, the encroachment on the forest lands has been
continuously evident. A consequence of the land cover (LC) changes has a profound effect on soil
erosion which plays important role in the context of sustainable development of natural resources. The
study thus aims to model the amount of soil loss as a result of land cover change with the use of multi -
temporal satellite data and the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE). The study area, the Upper
Namphong Watershed, is located in Northeast Thailand and covers about 4,424 Sq.Km. The multi -
temporal satellite data used for LC changes were Landsat TM acquired in 1990 and 2001 and
SPOT/HVR in 2007. The LC of each image scene was digitally performed using tree - decision method
and verification with the ground investigation. The LC was digitally encoded in GIS database for further
analysis. The USLE was used to determine the soil loss for the years 1990, 2001 and 2007. Comparison
of soil loss for the three years studied as related to LC was made providing the impact of LC changes on
the amount of soil loss in terms of spatial and quantitative contents. The study highlighted that severe
erosion covered mostly in the steep slope with deforestation and misuse of land. The result provided
spatial distribution of soil erosion for the three years and overall insight into causes of soil erosion as a
result of LC changes in combination with the other USLE factors.