  We present an exploratory population dynamics approach, described by
Lotka-Volterra (LV) generalized equations, to explain/predict the dynamics and
competition between land use/land cover (LULC) classes over vulnerable regions
in Uruguay. We use the Mapbiomas-Pampa dataset composed by 20 annual LULC maps
from 2000-2019. From these LULC maps we extract the main LULC classes, their
spatial distribution and the time series of areas covered for each class. The
interaction coefficients between species are inferred through the pairwise
maximum entropy (PME) method from the spatial covariance matrices for different
training periods. The main finding is that this LVPME method globally
outperforms the more traditional Markov chains approach at predicting the
trajectories of areas of LULC classes.
