Spatio-Temporal Pattern and Conflict Identification of Production–Living–Ecological Space in the Yellow River Basin

Abstract

Production–living–ecological space (PLES) is the main body of the optimization of the development and protection pattern of territorial space, and the spatial conflict in PLES reflects a struggle for ecological protection and socio-economic development in the process of spatial development and utilization. The Yellow River Basin is one of the most concentrated and prominent areas of spatial conflict of PLES in China. Therefore, clarifying the spatio-temporal pattern of PLES of the region and scientifically identifying the characteristics of its spatial conflict will significantly improve the efficiency of comprehensive utilization of spatial resources, promote the integrated and orderly development of resource elements in the basin, and eventually achieve the strategic goals of ecological protection and high-quality development of the Yellow River Basin. In this research, the CA–Markov model was applied to simulate the spatio-temporal pattern of PLES in the Yellow River Basin from 2010 to 2025, and the landscape ecology method was adopted to construct the spatial conflict of the PLES measurement model for identifying the spatio-temporal trends of conflicts and their intensity. The results reveal that, from 2010 to 2025, ecological–production space (EPS) dominates the PLES in the Yellow River Basin, as its total area remains stable amid fluctuations; living–production space (LPS) shows the most notable change, as it grows yearly along with urbanization and industrialization process of the region; the transition between ecological–production space (EPS) and production–ecological space (PES) is the most frequent, and the two also account for the largest area. Spatial conflict of PLES in the Yellow River Basin is mainly reflected in the encroachment of LPS on other PLES, concentrated in the regions from Hekou Town to the left bank of Longmen, Fen River, Shizuishan to the southern bank of Hekou Town, and Daxia River and Tao River in the Yellow River Basin. From 2010 to 2025, the space conflict composite index of PLES (SCCI) of most regions in the basin lies within 0.7, which is a stable or basically controllable level. Among the 29 tertiary water resource divisions in the Yellow River Basin, the SCCI of 15 indicate a major, decreasing trend.