Journal
ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING AND ASSESSMENT
Volume 187, Issue 10, Pages -Publisher
SPRINGER
DOI: 10.1007/s10661-015-4881-z
Keywords
Land cover change; Grain for Green (GFG) policy; Shaanxi Province; Payment for environmental/ecosystemservices (PES)
Categories
Funding
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [41271103, 40901093]
- Ministry of Education of Humanities and Social Science Project of China [10YJC790017]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
This study examines landscape changes in the context of China's national Grain for Green (GFG) policy, one of the world's largest payment for environmental/ecosystem services (PES) programs. We explored landscape structures and dynamics between 2000 and 2010 in Shaanxi Province, the Chinese province with the greatest amount of cropland conversion and reforestation in recent decades. We used Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM)-derived data and landscape metrics for six land cover classes to determine (1) the major land cover changes during enforcement of the policy, (2) the spatial and temporal variations in these changes, and (3) the effects of land cover changes on landscape structure and dynamics. The results suggested that provincial-level land cover changes modestly reflected the goals of the GFG. Over the 10-year study period, the forest and grassland coverages expanded from 95,737.9 to 97,017.4 km(2) and from 37,235.9 to 40,613.1 km(2), respectively, while the cropland coverage decreased from 59,222.8 to 54,007.6 km(2). The conversion direction differed regionally: the targeted croplands in Shanbei, namely, types III and IV, were mainly transformed into grassland while those in Shannan were mainly transformed into forestland. Reforestation was associated with increased inter-landscape aggregation and connection. Despite this large-scale reforestation trend, we found notable and significant differences in the land cover changes at the subprovincial level.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available