Ecological Protection Red Line Research Articles

Application of MSPA-MCR models to construct ecological security pattern in the basin: A case study of Dawen River basin

Building an ecological security pattern (ESP) can safeguard and improve the structure, functions and services of regional ecosystems. Furthermore, it is also one of the significant spatial methods to mitigate the conflict between ecological conservation and economic growth. Most previous researches on the construction of ESP have directly utilized extensive regions of forestland, grassland, water area or nature reserves as ecological sources (ESs) without weighing the habitat quality (HQ) and ecological protection red line (EPRL). The ES of the Dawen River basin (DRB) was identified through morphological spatial pattern analysis (MSPA) and landscape connectivity index. By employing the minimum cumulative resistance model (MCR), the potential ecological corridor (EC) was identified, and its importance was evaluated by gravity model. Simultaneously, the spatial properties of HQ and ecological resistance (ER) were analyzed. Finally, this paper proposed an optimization strategy for ESP in accordance with the EPRL. The results indicate that: (1) The DRB contained 15 important ESs, mainly concentrated in water and mountain forest areas. (2) 105 ECs were extracted by MCR and gravity model, including 35 level 1 corridors and 70 level 2 corridors, which were primarily concentrated in the eastern region of the basin. (3) Based on the spatial characteristics of HQ and ER, as well as the EPRL in the research, the ESP of “one axis, two belts and five zones” in the DRB was constructed and control strategies were proposed. This research offers some reference for ecological environment protection and restoration and regional sustainable development in the Yellow River basin.

Assessment and management for future habitat risks under the implementation of China's territorial spatial planning: A case study from Hainan Island

Land management policies and their spatial planning are crucial factors leading to the rise of future habitat risks. However, the differences in future habitat risks under various spatial policies and their combinations remain unclear, and there is a lack of targeted measures to manage these risks in China's territorial spatial planning. The study developed a feasible framework to tackle this issue. Eight future land use scenarios were simulated based on the combination of land management policies and spatial planning data, and then the habitat risks associated with each scenario were evaluated. Moreover, the study quantified habitat risk variations across diverse scenarios by examining the spatiotemporal changes in risk centers and their associated risk values. Lastly, the study identified critical risk zones based on the assessment results of risk levels and suggested relevant control strategies. The study area chosen was Hainan Island, a region experiencing rapid urbanization and possessing significant ecological resources. The results suggest that while development plans mitigate habitat loss, they accelerate the movement speed of the risk gravity center by up to 5 times. Under the implementation of farmland protection policies, the overall risk levels exhibit a noticeable increase, with the risk level at the center of gravity rising by up to 3.5 times. Implementing ecological protection red lines reduces the transfer rate of habitat risk centers by at least 0.4 times but generally leads to increased habitat risk levels. This study reveals future habitat risk under China's major land management policies and strengthens habitat risk management worldwide.

Ecological redline delineation based on the supply and demand of ecosystem services

As the bottom line of safeguarding ecological security, the term “ecological redline”, which was proposed in China, has important guidance and management value for maintaining ecological stability. The relationship between the supply and demand of ecosystem services (SDES) is a game between the supply side and the demand side of ecosystem services, reflecting the sustainability of ecosystem service functions and the harmony between the ecology and economy. Ecological redline is closely related to SDES. However, at present, the theoretical relationship between ecological redline and SDES has not been analyzed in depth, and the explanation in the “Technical Guidelines for the delineation of ecological protection redlines” (hereinafter referred to as “Guideline”) is vague. This paper analyzes the relationship between ecological redline and SDES, and further emphasizes that the delineation of ecological redlines includes the consideration of the relationship between supply and demand of ecosystem services. The difference between the supply and demand of ecosystem services (ESr) was used to represent SDES. A systematic method called “ecological redline delineation based on the supply and demand of ecosystem services (ERDBESs)” was proposed, including the calculation of ESr, the analysis of land use conversion, the identification of the scope of ecological protection, and the map of the ecological redline with ArcGIS. Urumqi was taken as the case city to conduct ERDBESs. The results showed that the total area of the ecological redline of Urumqi is 1826.23 square kilometers (km2), accounting for about 12.9% of the total area, in consistent with the announced ecological redline of Urumqi. The results show that the ecological redline delineation method in the Guideline actually includes the consideration of SDES, and this study provides a demonstration for it. This study regarded the ERDBESs as a feasible and rational method to delineate ecological redline and can be used as the theoretical support for the Guideline to practise ecological redline delineation based on SDES, enhancing the policy implications of the Guidance regarding the implicit logic between ecological redline and SDES.

Research on the delineation and optimization of ecological protection redline based on the perspective of ecological security pattern in typical black soil areas of Northeast China

Research on the delineation and optimization of ecological protection redline based on the perspective of ecological security pattern in typical black soil areas of Northeast China

Multi-objective land use optimization based on integrated NSGA–II–PLUS model: Comprehensive consideration of economic development and ecosystem services value enhancement

Urbanization and industrialization have resulted in an excessive intensity of land use, structural imbalances, and regional ecological deterioration. To achieve sustainable development, it is essential to optimize different land use types and enhance the ecosystem service value (ESV). However, previous studies rarely combined the optimization of land use quantitative structure with the simulation of land use spatial layout under the background of maximizing economic and ecological benefits at the same time, and this kind of research was rarely applied to state-level new areas. On the premise of maximizing economic and ecological benefits, this study develops an improved optimization method that integrates the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II) with the patch generating land use simulation (PLUS) model. The approach optimizes land use while predicting ESV for a state-level new area-Liangjiang New Area (LJNA). The model operation takes into full account ecological spatial constraints, including ecological protection red line, prime farmland, and urban development land use suitability. Results show that LJNA encountered the most substantial increase in built-up land (392.31 km2) due to farmland occupation, leading to a continuous decrease in ESV (443.6 million yuan) from 2000 to 2020. Optimization results for 2030 indicate that the main difference between different scenarios is the area of forest and built-up land. Under ecological protection priority scenario, ESV will increase in 2030 but built-up land should be confined within 620 km2. We present multiple land use scenarios based on decision makers’ preferences, offering important implications for the balance and optimization of land resources under different policy priorities using coupled spatiotemporal simulation-quantitative allocation model. This study provides valuable references for future land use optimization research.

Multi-scenario simulation of carbon budget balance in arid and semi-arid regions

The carbon budget has emerged as a central focus in global carbon cycle research. The limited understanding of carbon budget balance dynamics has led to an increasing imbalance between ecological and socio-economic benefits. Building upon a comprehensive analysis of carbon storage and emission in Lanzhou from 2000 to 2020, this study develops a novel deep learning model (CNN-LSTM) to simulate carbon budget under various scenarios from 2030 to 2050. Additionally, scientifically grounded recommendations for carbon compensation are provided. The results demonstrate several key findings: (1) The deep learning model exhibits outstanding performance, with an average overall accuracy exceeding 0.93. The coupled model outperforms individual models, underscoring the significance and necessity of incorporating both temporal and spatial features in land use simulation. (2) Under the ecological protection redline scenario from 2030 to 2050, a noteworthy augmentation in carbon storage and a proficient constraint on carbon emissions are observed. This substantiates the effectiveness of ecological protection interventions. (3) Carbon compensation payment areas are predominantly concentrated in built-up land, with the extent of these areas expanding over time. (4) The disparities in carbon balance effects of forest were more conspicuous than that of built-up land across diverse temporal and scenarios.

Ecological Security Assessment and Territory Spatial Restoration and Management of Inland River Basin—Based on the Perspective of Production–Living–Ecological Space

Ecological security evaluation and land space governance are effective ways to ensure regional ecological security and realize sustainable development. This study evaluated the ecological security status at the raster scale and conducted research on the restoration and governance of the national territory, with the aim of implementing accurate restoration, reducing ecological restoration costs, and increasing ecological restoration benefits. Taking the typical arid inland river Shule River Basin as an example, this study selected evaluation factors from production, living, and ecological perspectives, obtained the influencing factors of regional ecological security by spatial principal component analysis, and calculated the ecological security index on the grid scale of production, life and ecological space. The macro-scale national parks, ecological protection red line and other realistic constraints are combined with the grid-scale ecological security evaluation results to achieve accurate land space restoration and governance. The results show that the ecological space accounts for 79.23%, and the production space only accounts for 7.47%, which is similar to other inland river basins in arid areas. The study found that per capita GDP and distance to the road have a significant impact on the ecological security of the study area from the perspectives of production and life, while distance to the water, vegetation coverage, and land cover have a significant impact on ecological security from the ecological perspective. Moderate, moderate low and low ecological security zones account for 72.09% of the total area of the basin, indicating that the ecological security guarantee ability of the Shule River Basin is low. The ecological security level of the living space was the lowest, and the ecological security pattern of the basin area as a whole presented a “higher in the north and south and lower in the middle” characteristic. The land restoration and governance of the Shule River Basin area was divided into five types of ecological control, ecological conservation, ecological enhancement, ecological restoration and ecological management, of which the ecological control area accounted for as much as 35.86%, implying that ecological security in the Shule River Basin has attracted sufficient attention from the government. It is considered that the management of production and living space is more difficult, complex and important, and the proportion of space is relatively small, so it is necessary to focus on the comprehensive management project of ecological protection and restoration. However, the ecological endowment conditions of ecological space in the Shule River Basin are relatively poor, and the distribution area is vast, so natural restoration should be given priority, supplemented by artificial restoration. This study provides a reference for regional ecological security evaluation, ecological civilization construction, and national ecological security research and practice.

Comprehensive evaluation system for vegetation ecological quality: a case study of Sichuan ecological protection redline areas.

Dynamic monitoring and evaluation of vegetation ecological quality (VEQ) is indispensable for ecological environment management and sustainable development. Single-indicator methods that have been widely used may cause biased results due to neglect of the variety of vegetation ecological elements. We developed the vegetation ecological quality index (VEQI) by coupling vegetation structure (vegetation cover) and function (carbon sequestration, water conservation, soil retention, and biodiversity maintenance) indicators. The changing characteristics of VEQ and the relative contribution of driving factors in the ecological protection redline areas in Sichuan Province (EPRA), China, from 2000 to 2021 were explored using VEQI, Sen's slope, Mann-Kendall test, Hurst index, and residual analysis based on the XGBoost (Extreme gradient boosting regressor). The results showed that the VEQ in the EPRA has improved over the 22-year study period, but this trend may be unsustainable in the future. Temperature was the most influential climate factor. And human activities were the dominant factor with a relative contribution of 78.57% to VEQ changes. This study provides ideas for assessing ecological restoration in other regions, and can provide guidance for ecosystem management and conservation.

An Improved Future Land-Use Simulation Model with Dynamically Nested Ecological Spatial Constraints

A land-use simulation model oriented toward ecological constraints is effective for evaluating the ecological impact of urban spatial planning. However, few studies have incorporated dynamically nested ecological spatial constraints into the model or fully considered the urban development, agricultural production, and ecological function among the ecological spatial constraints. Therefore, this study developed an improved land-use simulation model with dynamically nested ecological spatial constraints (LSDNE). We fully considered the multilevel ecological spatial constraints from the perspectives of ecological (ecological protection red line, EPRL), production (capital farmland, CF), and living (urban development land-use suitability, UDLS). Five scenarios in terms of future land-use distribution in 2030 were set, namely, inertial development (S1), considering EPRL (S2), considering CF (S3), considering EPRL and CF (S4), and considering EPRL, CF, and UDLS (S5). This new approach was implemented in the rapidly developing provincial capital city of Changchun, China. The results show that, due to the occupation of arable land, Changchun had the largest increase in built-up land (2019.75 km2 to 3036.36 km2) from 2010 to 2020. Terrain elevation was the most significant factor in all kinds of land expansion. According to future land spatial distribution results in 2030, under S4, Changchun’s built-up land will be more compact compared with S1–S3 and S5, which showed more scattered built-up land. These predicted results show that Changchun’s spatial planning put forward high requirements for the efficient use of land and constraints in red-line areas. Due to a clear evaluation of the impact of ecological spatial constraints on future land expansion, the LSDNE model provides more accurate support for the efficient use of land resources and future territorial spatial planning.

Fallow priority areas for spatial trade-offs between cost and efficiency in China

Fallow pilot policies exist in China but fallow priority areas have yet to be identified based on eco-environmental stressors and spatial cost-benefit analyses. Here we use a multi-criteria optimization algorithm to determine fallow priority areas based on soil pollution, groundwater overexploitation, land quality, and ecological protection redlines delineation data and with high-cost effectiveness. By considering five spatial scenarios on three objective functions, we find most notably that fallowing the top 20% of priority areas, the benefit of pollution control and environmental protection can be achieved by up to 98.7% and 64.7%, respectively. Our results show that effective fallow prioritization on cultivated land may reduce implementation costs by up to 509.3 billion USD, corresponding to 13.6% of China’s budget in 2021. Thus, effective fallow prioritization will promote sustainable land use by pursuing goals between benefits and cost synergistically and allow budget allocation to other sustainable agricultural targets based on agricultural diversification.

Defining Important Areas for Ecosystem Conservation in Qinghai Province under the Policy of Ecological Red Line

Delimiting important ecological conservation areas is critical for ecological integrity, sustainability of the ecological service function, and management of environmental degradation. However, the process of defining important areas for ecological protection purposes is elusive, especially in the Qinghai Province of China, which is home to unique ecosystems. To address this issue, we selected biodiversity (endangered mammals, birds, and plants), soil retention, water storage, and carbon sequestration to define and delimit important areas for the protection of these ecosystem functions. We found that the important endangered birds of Qinghai Province were mainly distributed in the eastern and southern parts, while important endangered plants were relatively centralized, with relatively high distribution in the Golog of Qinghai Province. The total amounts were 2.245 billion tons, 46.513 billion m3, and 60.91 Tg for soil retention, water storage, and carbon sequestration in Qinghai ecosystems, respectively. Soil retention and carbon sequestration presented a similar trend, with high levels in the eastern and low levels in the western parts of Qinghai, while water storage was higher in the south than in the north. Among various ecosystem types, the grassland ecosystem was the main body of soil retention, water retention, and carbon sequestration; soil retention, water retention, and carbon sequestration were quite small in the desert, town, and city ecosystems. By evaluating the spatial distribution of the service functions of ecosystems, we found that extremely important areas of the ecosystem service function in Qinghai Province totaled 247,200 square kilometers, and the important areas summed to 124,500 square kilometers. Combined extremely important and important areas of the ecosystem service function reached 371,700 square kilometers and accounted for 53.36% of the total area of Qinghai. The ecological protection red line has now become an important national strategy for ecological protection. The demarcation of the ecological protection red line has great significance in safeguarding Qinghai’s ecological security. It is the basic guarantee for sustainable economic and social development in China.

High-precision Ecological Protection Red Line Boundary Optimization for Fangshan District, Beijing, China

High-precision Ecological Protection Red Line Boundary Optimization for Fangshan District, Beijing, China

Study on the Evolution and Optimization of the Spatial Structure of the Oasis in the Arid Area: A Case Study of the Aksu River Basin in China.

To achieve high-quality sustainable development in arid areas based on the concept of ecological civilization, it is necessary to deeply study the territorial spatial structure characteristics. Taking the Aksu River Basin, an important ecological security barrier in northwest China, as an example, this paper follows the research idea of "feature analysis-suitability evaluation-conflict identification analysis-optimization" and constructs a comprehensive model based on the AHP-entropy weight comprehensive evaluation method, ArcGIS spatial identification analysis, variance coefficient-TOPSIS method, and NRCA. A comprehensive model based on the AHP-entropy power integrated evaluation method, ArcGIS spatial identification analysis, variance coefficient-TOPSIS method, and NRCA was constructed to guide the optimization of the territorial spatial layout by exploring the characteristics of territorial spatial pattern, the suitability of territorial spatial development, the identification of territorial spatial conflicts, and the efficiency and functional advantage of territorial spatial utilization in the study area. The results show that: (1) The spatial type of territorial space in the Aksu River Basin from 2000 to 2020 is dominated by ecological space, agricultural space, and urban space, and the three spatial boundaries are irregularly interlaced. (2) The spatial utilization conflict pattern of the Aksu River Basin has formed, and the general conflict area is overgrowing. (3) The overall efficiency of territorial utilization in the Aksu River Basin is low, with significant differences among county administrative units. (4) After optimization, the three types of space in the watershed are adjusted and refined into six functional areas: basic farmland protection area, rural development area, ecological protection red line area, ecological control area, urban development area, and industrial supporting construction area.

How does ecological protection redline policy affect regional land use and ecosystem services?

Land use has been widely recognized as an important factor affecting ecosystem services. Therefore, China is applying Ecological Protection Redline (EPR) policy to conserve essential land with important ecosystem services or ecological vulnerability. This study focuses on how and how much EPR affects the ecosystem services, and relative studies are rare. This study establishes a framework and applies it to a case study in Guizhou to assess the influence on land use directly and ecosystem services indirectly under the EPR policy intervention. The framework assembles land use predictions, climate predictions, ecosystem services valuation, and scenario analysis. This study can provide simulative and quantitative evidence for EPR's influences. The results show that EPR protects the ecological land against land use changes; moreover, such protection influences non-EPR regions. Certain ecosystem services are also improved. In Guizhou, there will be an increase in soil retention and carbon sequestration and a decrease in water yield. This study can thus provide a technical framework to predict EPR's effects.

Grassland Ecological Compensation, Income Level and Policy Satisfaction: An Empirical Analysis Based on a Survey of Herders in Ecological Protection Redline Areas

In the past 10 years, the implementation of grassland ecological compensation policy has played an important role in the sustainable development of the pastoral economy. How much impact on herders will delineating the ecological conservation redline have? Such delineation is significant for the smooth implementation of the ecological conservation redline. Based on this, taking the three banner counties with a large area under the control area of the ecological redline of the Xilin Gol as examples, OLS and quantile regression were used to analyze the impact of a grassland ecological compensation policy on herdsmen’s income level, and the ordered Probit model was used to analyze the influencing factors of herdsmen’s satisfaction with the policy. The results show that: (1) grassland ecological compensation has a significant positive impact on low-income herders in ecological protection redline areas; (2) grassland ecological compensation, income and the implementation of current policy have a positive impact on the satisfaction of herders in the redline area; (3) herdsmen are highly satisfied with the grassland ecological compensation policy, but there is still a lot of room for improvement in the compensation policy after the redline is delineated. In this regard, we should increase compensation for areas with a high proportion of ecological conservation redlines, and explore ways to increase income from animal husbandry products. At the same time, we should strengthen the publicity of ecological protection redline policies and promote the timely disbursement of funds, reconstruct the grassland ecological compensation mechanism by strengthening policy incentives and hardening regulatory constraints, and effectively improve the policy efficiency of ecological protection redlines.

A Comparative Study of Various Land Use and Land Cover Change Models to Predict Ecosystem Service Value

Ecosystem services are closely related to human well-being and are vulnerable to high-intensity human land-use activities. Understanding the evolution of land use and land cover (LULC) changes and quantifying ecosystem service value (ESV) are significant for sustainable development. In this study, we used land use and land cover data and other data from 2000 to 2020 to analyze the evolution of land use and land cover and ESV in Tongliao, China. With the goal of exploring the characteristics of different cellular automata (CA)-based models, CA-Markov, Future Land Use Simulation (FLUS), and Patch-generating Land Use Simulation (PLUS) models were used to simulate future land use and land cover, and the results were verified and compared. Considering the impacts of policies for capital farmland (CF) and ecological protection red line (EPRL) in the context of territorial spatial planning, four scenarios (inertial development, S1; CF, S2; EPRL, S3; EPRL and CF, S4) were set. The results showed that from 2000 to 2020, farmland and built-up land increased the most (341.18 km2 and 220.56 km2), while grassland had the largest decrease (380.08 km2). The main mutual transitions were from grassland and farmland. The total ESV showed a decreasing trend (from 52,364.56 million yuan to 51,620.62 million yuan). The simulation results for 2035 under four scenarios were similar, where farmland would decrease the most (96.81 km2). The ESV in 2035 would decrease from 51,620.62 million yuan to 51,541.12 million. In addition, under scenarios for the impact of policy, the land showed a trend of scattered expansion. This study provides a scientific basis for making regional sustainable development policy decisions and implementing ecological environmental protection measures.

Spatiotemporal pattern and driving forces of ecological carrying capacity during urbanization process in the Dongting Lake area, China

Ecological carrying capacity (ECC) is a key indicator for assessing the sustainable urbanization. The Dongting Lake area, as a national eco-economic zone, is urgently required to focus on the spatiotemporal pattern of ECC based on interactive mechanism of urbanization and ECC, which is revealed through quantitative research method in 2001–2019. The results show the ECC value appeared a fluctuating downward trend from 1.4645 to 0.8527, and the bearing state changed from under-loading to overloading. The bearing states of 17 counties showed spatially higher heterogeneous with Moran’s I value from 0.2635 to 0.3194. Yuanjiang City, Nanxian County and Taojiang County were in an under-loading state and the remaining 14 counties in an overloading state. The spatial distribution pattern displayed an “M”-type spatial differentiation pattern from southwest to northeast, the central region was evidently better than the surrounding regions. The bearing state had a positive global spatial autocorrelation. Spatial distribution of hot spots showed that the central area was a cold spot area, the edge area was a hot spot area, and the peripheral area was a sub-cold and sub-hot area. Factor detector results reveal that the urban population concentration, economic growth, land expansion, technology levels, and government policies were the main driving factors that formed the spatiotemporal pattern of ECC. The results could make up for the research shortcomings of spatiotemporal pattern of ECC, provide support to control ecological protection red line and urban exploitation boundaries, and help Chinese government formulate effective measurements to optimize the spatiotemporal pattern of ECC.

[Urbanization and ecological effect in mid-southern Liaoning urban agglomeration, China].

China has entered the stage of rapid urbanization since the 1990s, resulting in a series of environmental problems. Based on the nighttime light remote sensing data and land use data from 1995 to 2020, we extracted the compound night light index (CNLI) to measure the urbanization level of mid-southern Liaoning urban agglomeration, evaluated habitat quality by InVEST model. We examined the relationship between urbanization level and habitat quality in mid-southern Liaoning urban agglomeration by using the correlation analysis method and the geographic weighted regression model. The results showed that CNLI increased by 0.14 from 1995 to 2020. The urbanization level increased continuously, with a pattern of "low in the east and high in the west". The habitat quality decreased by 0.005, showing a pattern of "high in the east and low in the west". The ecological environment became worse. There was a significant negative spatial correlation between urbanization level and habitat quality in mid-southern Liaoning urban agglomeration. The negative impact of urbanization level on habitat quality gradually decreased. In order to alleviate habitat degradation caused by urbanization and realize the coordinated and sustainable development of regional social economy, it was urgent to take a series of measures, such as delimiting the ecological protection red line, improving the intensive use of land, delimiting the urban boundary, promoting the coordinated development of regional integration.

Comparison of multimodel simulations of land use and land cover change considering integrated constraints - A case study of the Fuxian Lake basin

The simulation and future prediction of spatial and temporal land use and land cover change (LUCC) have long been the focus (and challenge) of research on land use change and sustainable development. However, the existing research lacks empirical comparisons among different simulation models under the same conditions in the same region; hence, the most accurate simulation results cannot be obtained through the optimal model. In this paper, taking the Fuxian Lake basin as an example, the CA-Markov, FLUS, and PLUS models are adopted to explore the optimal model for simulating LUCC in this basin by integrating restricted areas of LUCC. This study shows the following. (1) The simulation results are more accurate under the joint restrictions of open water, prohibited development zones and ecological protection red lines than under a single restriction. (2) All three models can simulate the LUCC in the Fuxian Lake basin. Among these models, the PLUS model has the highest simulation accuracy in simulating LUCC at the basin scale and offers the best match of land types in terms of their quantity and spatial distribution. (3) The PLUS model can accurately predict the changes of LULC in the Fuxian Lake basin. The results of this study should help decision makers evaluate land use development patterns and provide a reference for the formulation of regional sustainable development policies.

Application of the MaxEnt model in improving the accuracy of ecological red line identification: A case study of Zhanjiang, China

China's Ecological protection Red Lines (ERLs) policy has proven effective in protecting ecological resources, restoring ecosystems and promoting regional ecological civilization. However, the existing methods for identifying high-value ecological conservation land are insufficiently less precise and quantitative, which affects the implementation of the ERL policy. In this study, the Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) model was introduced into the identification work of ERLs. This paper began with an assessment of the ecological status of Zhanjiang based on the methodology for assessing Ecosystem Services (ESs) function in the “Guidelines for the Delineation of Ecological Protection Red Lines”. On this basis, the MaxEnt model was used to predict the extent of potential high-value ecological protection land through sample training and quantify the contribution of impact factors common to ecological planning work. The following conclusions were obtained: The regional ecosystem of Zhanjiang had a good function of soil and water conservation services and a poor function of windbreak and sand-fixation services. The importance of ESs was strongest in western Leizhou and the southeast coastal region of Xuwen and weakest in Wuchuan and central Xuwen. Among the contributions of influencing factors to identify high-value ecological land, natural factors were the dominant influencing factors, and anthropogenic factors were the secondary influencing factors. Meteorological factors represented by dryness made the greatest information contribution to identifying high-value ecological protection land at 42.0%, followed by surface vegetation biomass (represented by NPP) at 37.1%. The remaining impact factors contributed less than 10.0%, and the distance from the road factor contributed 0 in this prediction. The MaxEnt model, when applied to the delineation of ERLs, has been proven to be effective in improving the accuracy of identifying high-value ecological land and discovering areas with conservation value that traditional assessment methods have overlooked. It will help to provide a reasonable basis for the identification of ERLs and promote the implementation of ERL policy.