Spatiotemporal Variability of Human Disturbance Impacts on Ecosystem Services in Mining Areas

Shaobo Liu, Li Liu, Jiang Li, Qingping Zhou, Yifeng Ji, Wenbo Lai and Cui Long
Additional contact information
Shaobo Liu: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Li Liu: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Jiang Li: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Qingping Zhou: School of Mathematics and Statistics, HNP-LAMA, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Yifeng Ji: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Wenbo Lai: School of Architecture, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510641, China
Cui Long: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 13, 1-20

Abstract: Human activities pose significant impacts on ecosystem services (ESs) in mining areas, which will continually increase over time and space. However, the mechanism of ES change on spatiotemporal scales post-disturbance remains unclear, especially in the context of global climate change. Here, we conducted a global literature review on the impact of two of the most frequent disturbance factors (mining and restoration) on 27 different ESs, intending to synthesize the impacts of human disturbance on ESs in mining areas via a meta-analysis, and analyze the spatiotemporal variability of ESs after disturbance. We screened 3204 disturbance studies published on the Web of Science between 1950 and 2020 and reviewed 340 in detail. The results of independence test showed that human disturbance had a significant impact on ESs in the mining areas ( p < 0.001). The impacts (positive and/or negative) caused by mining and restoration differed considerably among ESs (even on the same ESs). Additionally, spatiotemporal scales of human disturbance were significantly related to spatiotemporal scales of ES change ( p < 0.001). We found that the positive and negative impacts of disturbances on ESs may be interconversion under specific spatiotemporal conditions. This seems to be associated with spatiotemporal variability, such as the temporal lag, spatial spillover, and cumulative spatiotemporal effects. Climate changes can lead to further spatiotemporal variability, which highlights the importance of understanding the changes in ESs post-disturbance on spatiotemporal scales. Our research presents recommendations for coping with the twofold pressure of climate change and spatiotemporal variability, to understand how ESs respond to human disturbance at spatiotemporal scales in the future, and manage disturbances to promote sustainable development in mining areas.

Keywords: spatiotemporal variability; ecosystem services; mining and restoration; temporal lag effect; spatial spillover effect; spatiotemporal cumulative effect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/13/7547/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/13/7547/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:13:p:7547-:d:843877

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().