Abstract
Abstract Background Anthropological activities could lead to various land use changes. This subsequently exerts impacts on the Ecological status as the land is the carrier of Ecosystems and their services. Ecosystem Services Values (ESVs) are monetary assessment of ecosystems services. The choice of ecosystem services valuation methods highly depends on the type and conditions of the ecological environment. Results In this paper, Zhifangou watershed, a watershed with fragile environments in Loess Plateau, is analyzed in terms of the historical changes of land uses and their impact on Ecosystem Services Values (ESVs). The analysis presents that the watershed had seen a large cover of forest (689.8 hectare) and grassland (97.08 hectare) until 1938, which were substituted with a cropland of 663.56 hectare in the following years, and then a gradual recovery of natural land from 1978. During these years, the human activities have ranged from little disruption, to excessive cultivation, and finally to an integrated management of the watershed. The ESVs were highest at $121.77 × 104 in 1938, lowest at $43.75 × 104 in 1958, and then rebounded to $113.44 × 104 in 1999. Conclusions The analysis reveals that the values of soil formation and retention, biodiversity protection, and climate regulation have been associated with the largest share of the total ESVs. Among them, soil formation and retention was recognized as the most impacted service by land use changes.
Highlights
Anthropological activities could lead to various land use changes
Building on previous research by Xie et al (2003) and Zhang et al (2011) on the Ecosystem Services Values (ESVs), in this paper we propose an ESV analysis of Zhifanggou watershed on the basis of historical data on land use changes
We have customized the ecosystem services valuation approach developed by Costanza et al (1997) according to Xie et al (2003) to account for specific characteristics of ecosystems in China
Summary
Anthropological activities could lead to various land use changes. This subsequently exerts impacts on the Ecological status as the land is the carrier of Ecosystems and their services. The land supplies mass and energy, which are the main drivers of economic development (Darwin et al 1996) as well as various Ecosystem Services (ES). The latter are defined as the conditions and processes through which natural ecosystems and the species that comprise them, sustain and fulfill human well-being (Daily 1997). Some examples of such services provided by land cover are biodiversity, water filtration, retention of soil, and air purification, just to name a few (Nasiri and Huang 2007). An inappropriate land allocation and use may lead to significant degradation of local and regional ecological services (Collin and Melloul 2001)
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