TY - JOUR
T1 - Land cover change during a period of extensive landscape restoration in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, China
AU - Cadavid Restrepo, Angela M.
AU - Yang, Yu Rong
AU - Hamm, Nicholas A.S.
AU - Gray, Darren J.
AU - Barnes, Tamsin S.
AU - Williams, Gail M.
AU - Soares Magalhães, Ricardo J.
AU - McManus, Donald P.
AU - Guo, Danhuai
AU - Clements, Archie C.A.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2017
PY - 2017/11/15
Y1 - 2017/11/15
N2 - Environmental change has been a topic of great interest over the last century due to its potential impact on ecosystem services that are fundamental for sustainable development and human well-being. Here, we assess and quantify the spatial and temporal variation in land cover in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (NHAR), China. With high-resolution (30 m) imagery from Landsat 4/5-TM and 8-OLI for the entire region, land cover maps of the region were created to explore local land cover changes in a spatially explicit way. The results suggest that land cover changes observed in NHAR from 1991 to 2015 reflect the main goals of a national policy implemented there to recover degraded landscapes. Forest, herbaceous vegetation and cultivated land increased by approximately 410,200 ha, 708,600 ha and 164,300 ha, respectively. The largest relative land cover change over the entire study period was the increase in forestland. Forest growth resulted mainly from the conversion of herbaceous vegetation (53.8%) and cultivated land (30.8%). Accurate information on the local patterns of land cover in NHAR may contribute to the future establishment of better landscape policies for ecosystem management and protection. Spatially explicit information on land cover change may also help decision makers to understand and respond appropriately to emerging environmental risks for the local population.
AB - Environmental change has been a topic of great interest over the last century due to its potential impact on ecosystem services that are fundamental for sustainable development and human well-being. Here, we assess and quantify the spatial and temporal variation in land cover in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (NHAR), China. With high-resolution (30 m) imagery from Landsat 4/5-TM and 8-OLI for the entire region, land cover maps of the region were created to explore local land cover changes in a spatially explicit way. The results suggest that land cover changes observed in NHAR from 1991 to 2015 reflect the main goals of a national policy implemented there to recover degraded landscapes. Forest, herbaceous vegetation and cultivated land increased by approximately 410,200 ha, 708,600 ha and 164,300 ha, respectively. The largest relative land cover change over the entire study period was the increase in forestland. Forest growth resulted mainly from the conversion of herbaceous vegetation (53.8%) and cultivated land (30.8%). Accurate information on the local patterns of land cover in NHAR may contribute to the future establishment of better landscape policies for ecosystem management and protection. Spatially explicit information on land cover change may also help decision makers to understand and respond appropriately to emerging environmental risks for the local population.
KW - Earth observations
KW - Environmental change
KW - Geographic information systems
KW - Land cover change
KW - Remote sensing
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85018633078&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.04.124
DO - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.04.124
M3 - Article
SN - 0048-9697
VL - 598
SP - 669
EP - 679
JO - Science of the Total Environment
JF - Science of the Total Environment
ER -