Spatial and temporal characteristics of soil conservation service in the area of the upper and middle of the Yellow River, China

Mingyong Zhu,Wenming He,Quanfa Zhang,Yongzhu Xiong,Shuduan Tan,Hongming He

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2019.e02985

Abstract

Soil erosion is an important environmental problem in the area of the upper and middle of the Yellow River (AUMYR), China, one of the most severe soil erosion areas in the world. It is significantly influences on the ecological security and sustainable development of the region. Soil conservation (SC) service, as one of the most important regulating services provided by ecosystems, can alter soil and water processes and improve ecosystem services that ensure human welfare. Investigations of spatial and temporal characteristics of SC service play important roles in soil erosion control and ecosystem protection in AUMYR. In the past several years, restoration projects (e.g. the Grain-for-Green project) were implemented to improve SC in most of AUMYR. It is needed to evaluate the change of SC service brought about by the projects. This study carries out quantitative spatial analysis of SC services through Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) model and geographic information system (GIS) manipulation based on various datasets, such as remote sensing image, digital elevation model (DEM), climate, and land use/cover maps. Soil retention calculated as potential soil erosion (erosion without vegetation cover) minus actual soil erosion was applied as indicator for SC service. The results are like these. (1) The total amount and mean capacity of SC service in AUMYR were 7.22 billion t/a and 142.2 t/hm2·a in 2000 and 10.19 billion t/a and 200.8 t/hm2·a in 2010, respectively. South-east AUMYR exhibited a much higher capacity of soil retaining than the north-west. (2) Forest ecosystems displayed higher SC capacity than other types of ecosystems. Moreover, the SC capacity of ecosystems increased with the increasing of slope gradient. (3) Variations of SC rate (the ratio of SC to potential soil erosion in percentage) in different units (ecosystem, slope zone and city) were relatively small and ca. 90% of potentially eroded soil was retained in AUMYR. (4) The spatial characteristics of SC service in AUMYR were primarily controlled by topography at the regional scale. Vegetation cover restoration significantly improved the capacity of SC service in AUMYR in the midst year of 2000 and 2010. The results revealed that ecological restoration efforts significantly enhanced SC service of ecosystem in the study area.

Highlights

Ecosystem services (ESs) are the benefits that people obtain from nature (Daily, 1997; Costanza et al, 1997; MA, 2005)
The results revealed that ecological restoration efforts significantly enhanced Soil conservation (SC) service of ecosystem in the study area
Distribution of SC service in different slope zones Comparisons among slope zones (Figure 5) showed that SC capacity of ecosystems increased with the increasing of slope gradient, and the mean SC capacity of slope zone of >35reached to 475.9 t/hm2⋅a in 2000 and 629.1 t/hm2⋅a in 2010

Summary

Introduction

Ecosystem services (ESs) are the benefits that people obtain from nature (Daily, 1997; Costanza et al, 1997; MA, 2005). Tremendous progress has been made in this field (Egoh et al, 2009; Su et al, 2012; Su and Fu, 2013; Guerra and Pinto-Correia, 2016; Yang and Tang, 2019), especially after Costanza et al (1997) established a milestone in ESs research by conducting the evaluation of nature's services in 1997. Su et al (2012) evaluated four kinds of ESs (i.e. net primary production (NPP), carbon sequestration and oxygen production, water conservation and soil conservation sediment control, water yield) in the Yanhe watershed on the Loess Plateau, China and proposed sustainable ecosystem management suggestions in the region. To disclose the relationship between farm management and ES provision, Guerra and Pinto-Correia (2016) studied the challenges and opportunities for soil erosion prevention in Mediterranean silvo-pastoral systems, and their results can be used to support land management and policy design

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Discussion

Conclusion