Land-sea interactions at the east coast of Hainan Island, South China Sea: A synthesis

The structure and function of coastal ecosystems is affected by land-based human activities, including changes in water, sediment and pollutant input, as well as land reclamation in coastal areas. Many coastal areas can be considered over-stressed systems as a whole, the ecosystem services of which are strongly impaired. This is particularly important in tropical regions, where the coastal zone is under the influence of a strong climate variability including monsoons and frequent extreme weather events, such as typhoons. During the past decades the continuous development of Hainan's coastal zone and its hinterland, in combination with episodic natural events (e.g., typhoons), caused environmental changes in its coastal ecosystems. However, little is known on the consequences of environmental changes for the biogeochemistry and ecology and, hence, the natural resources of the Hainan coastal ecosystems. The Sino-German inter-disciplinary LANCET (land-sea interactions along coastal ecosystems of tropical China: Hainan) project was designed to address these issues on a local to regional scale and at the same time, to contribute to the global data base in which this type of information from tropical regions is still under-represented. The results obtained from LANCET have been delivered to the local government for an adaptive management at the ecosystem level, and the knowledge is believed to be relevant to other studies of tropical and coastal regions. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.