The supply-consumption relationship of ecological resources under ecological civilization construction in China

The Chinese economy is moving from rapid growth to high-quality development, with the goal of striving for coordinated socioeconomic and eco-environmental development. Ensuring that ecosystem functions are not damaged by economic development is a primary goal of ecological civilization construction. Therefore, it is necessary to reveal the dependence relationships between humans and ecosystems, as well as the flow and appropriation of ecological resources between different regions. In this paper, Net Primary Productivity, as a measurable indicator of ecological resources, was used to analyze the supply-consumption relationship of ecological resources in China. The results showed that ecological resources are completely self-sufficient in China. However, the self-sufficiency of ecological resources decreased from 202% to 144%, while the ecosystem pressure increased by 10.12% with the growth of the population and living consumption level. Although the living demands for ecological resources in urbanized regions was increasing, the ecosystem pressure is decreasing by occupying the remote ecological resources, which leads to ecological consumption shifting to other functional regions. Meanwhile, driven by increasing local and remote living demands, the ecosystem pressure has obviously increased in main agricultural production regions, while slowly increased or even decreased in key ecological functional regions due to the guidance of ecological civilization construction. This study proved the effects of ecological civilization construction on harmonizing development in urbanized regions, while the growing ecological pressure also reminds us of the implementation of an inter-regional ecological payment transfer policy to ensure sustainable development in main agricultural production regions and key ecological functional regions.

Automated summary

The study demonstrates that China's ecological resources are self-sufficient, but the self-sufficiency rate decreased from 202% to 144% as population and living consumption levels increased, resulting in a 10.12% rise in ecosystem pressure. While urbanized regions are demanding more ecological resources, they are offsetting the pressure by accessing remote ecological resources, causing ecological consumption to shift to other regions. The implementation of ecological civilization construction has harmonized development in urbanized areas, but there is a growing need for an inter-regional ecological payment transfer policy to ensure sustainable development in agricultural production regions and key ecological functional areas.