Trade-offs between grain supply and soil conservation in the Grain for Green Program under changing climate: A case study in the Three Gorges Reservoir region

Abstract

Understanding the trade-offs between ecological benefits and cost of grain supply caused by ecosystem restoration is essential for decision-making. Nevertheless, due to climate change, the benefits of ecosystem restoration and cost of grain supply change across various spatial locations, thereby complicating the trade-offs. Taking one of China's largest scale ecosystem restorations, the Grain for Green Program (GGP), as an example, this study used the Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR) region as the case study area and combined the crop environment resource synthesis (CERES)-Crop model, future land-use simulation (FLUS), and the revised universal soil loss equation (RUSLE) to simulate future grain supply and soil erosion during 2021–2050 under three climate change and socioeconomic development scenarios (SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP5-8.5) in the TGR region. The results showed that: (1) Until 2050, the implementation of GGP would bring a large soil conservation benefit by reducing soil erosion of 2.47–5.68 million tons, at the cost of 130,277–660,279 tons decrease in grain production in the TGR region. (2) Under SSP5-8.5 climate change scenario with the highest rainfall in the future, the GGP would maintain the greatest soil conservation benefits, resulting in a total amount of soil erosion decrease by 2.55 to 5.68 million tons. (3) Trade-offs between benefit of reducing soil erosion and cost of grain supply vary considerably across income. Specifically, GGP benefits are greater under low-income and higher-emission scenarios, with significant gains in soil erosion control and less impact on grain supply. In contrast, in high-income and low-emission scenarios, the GGP results in less soil erosion control and greater impact on grain supply.