Impact of Land Use Intensity on Ecosystem Services: An Example from the Agro-Pastoral Ecotone of Central Inner Mongolia

Qian Li, Xuefeng Zhang, Qingfu Liu, Yang Liu, Yong Ding and Qing Zhang
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Qian Li: School of Ecology and Environment, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, China
Xuefeng Zhang: School of Ecology and Environment, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, China
Qingfu Liu: School of Ecology and Environment, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, China
Yang Liu: State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
Yong Ding: Grassland Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Hohhot 010010, China
Qing Zhang: School of Ecology and Environment, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, China

Sustainability, 2017, vol. 9, issue 6, 1-11

Abstract: Land use intensity is an important indicator of human activities, so we quantified the land use intensity and five ecosystem services (soil conservation, water conservation, carbon storage, net primary productivity (NPP), and crop production) in 13 subbasins of the Tabu River Basin in an agro-pastoral ecotone in central Inner Mongolia. Furthermore, we analyzed the relationships among ecosystem services and the responses of the services to the impact of land use intensity. The primary conclusions were as follows: (1) All five ecosystem services gradually diminished from the upper to the lower reaches of the Tabu River Basin; (2) Water conservation exhibited a trade-off relationship with soil conservation, NPP, and crop production, but it exhibited a synergistic relationship with carbon storage. There were also synergistic relationships between soil conservation, carbon storage, NPP, and crop production; (3) As land use intensity increased, soil conservation, NPP and crop production monotonically increased. In contrast, water conservation exhibited a monotonically decreasing trend, and carbon storage followed a unimodal curve; (4) In this region, suitable ecosystem services were sustained at a land use intensity of approximately 3.95.

Keywords: land use intensity; Inner Mongolia; agro-pastoral ecotone; regulating services; crop production (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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