Ecological Sensitivity Assessment and Spatial Pattern Analysis of Land Resources in Tumen River Basin, China

Abstract

Ecological sensitivity is one of the important indicators of regional ecological fragility, which can represent the sensitivity of ecosystems to natural environmental conditions and human activity disturbances in the region. In this study, the ecological sensitivity of land resources in the Tumen River Basin of China was quantitatively evaluated by taking 3 ecologically sensitive impact types, including the natural environment, human disturbance, and soil erosion, as evaluation criteria, and 11 ecologically sensitive factors were selected to build an evaluation system using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method, to determine the weights of the evaluation factors, combined with geographic information system (GIS) technology. The results show that: (1) Among the three types of ecological sensitivity factors, the influence of human disturbance is the most obvious, and the two factors of land use type and distance from construction land have the highest weights in the comprehensive ecological sensitivity evaluation. (2) There are no extremely sensitive areas or insensitive areas in the Tumen River Basin in China. Highly sensitive areas account for only 0.59% of the total area and are mainly concentrated in the lakes, rivers, and reservoirs in the study area. Moderately sensitive areas account for 54.12%, which are concentrated in the central part of the Tumen River Basin Slightly sensitive areas are mainly located in the mountainous areas in the north and south of the study area. (3) Among the various land resource types, the proportion of slightly sensitive areas and moderately sensitive areas of woodland is close (about 50%), while cultivated land, grassland, construction land, and bare land are mainly moderately sensitive areas (73.95%, 82.07%, 96.59%, and 78.78%), and water bodies are mostly distributed within highly sensitive areas (60.97%), and all wetlands with the smallest area are moderately sensitive. The results of the study can provide data support and a scientific basis for regional ecological protection and development planning.