Land Use and Land Cover Change in the Qinghai Lake Region of the Tibetan Plateau and Its Impact on Ecosystem Services.

Jian Gong,Jingye Li,Jianxin Yang,Wenwu Tang,Shicheng Li

doi:10.3390/ijerph14070818

Abstract

Exploration of land use and land cover change (LULCC) and its impacts on ecosystem services in Tibetan plateau is valuable for landscape and environmental conservation. In this study, we conduct spatial analysis on empirical land use and land cover data in the Qinghai Lake region for 1990, 2000, and 2010 and simulate land cover patterns for 2020. We then evaluate the impacts of LULCC on ecosystem service value (ESV), and analyze the sensitivity of ESV to LULCC to identify the ecologically sensitive area. Our results indicate that, from 1990 to 2010, the area of forest and grassland increased while the area of unused land decreased. Simulation results suggest that the area of grassland and forest will continue to increase and the area of cropland and unused land will decrease for 2010–2020. The ESV in the study area increased from 694.50 billion Yuan in 1990 to 714.28 billion Yuan in 2000, and to 696.72 billion Yuan in 2020. Hydrology regulation and waste treatment are the top two ecosystem services in this region. The towns surrounding the Qinghai Lake have high ESVs, especially in the north of the Qinghai Lake. The towns with high ESV sensitivity to LULCC are located in the northwest, while the towns in the north of the Qinghai Lake experienced substantial increase in sensitivity index from 2000–2010 to 2010–2020, especially for three regulation services and aesthetic landscape provision services.

Highlights

In this article, we focus on studying the impact of land use and land cover change on ecosystem services in Qinghai Lake region of the Tibetan Plateau
The general trend of land use and land cover change (LULCC) in the Qinghai Lake region for 1990–2010 was that the area of construction land, grassland, and cropland increased while the area of unused land7 and
We assessed the response of ecosystem services to LULCC at a township scale

Summary

Introduction

We focus on studying the impact of land use and land cover change on ecosystem services in Qinghai Lake region of the Tibetan Plateau. The Tibetan Plateau is the source of Asia’s major rivers, including Yangtze River, Yellow River, and Lancang/Mekong River. The Tibetan Plateau (often referred to as the third Pole besides the North and South Poles) plays a significant role in regulating the earth’s climate change [1]. The ecosystem of the Tibetan Plateau is fragile and very sensitive to global change and human intervention. Due to increased anthropogenic activities and global climate change, environmental conditions of the Tibetan Plateau have changed significantly in the past few decades [2,3,4], including grassland degradation, permafrost degradation, and biodiversity. Public Health 2017, 14, 818; doi:10.3390/ijerph14070818 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion