Ejin Oasis Land Use and Vegetation Change between 2000 and 2011: The Role of the Ecological Water Diversion Project

Xiaoli Hu, Ling Lu, Xin Li, Jianhua Wang and Xuegang Lu
Additional contact information
Xiaoli Hu: Key Laboratory of Remote Sensing of Gansu Province, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 320 Donggang West Road, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
Ling Lu: Key Laboratory of Remote Sensing of Gansu Province, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 320 Donggang West Road, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
Xin Li: Key Laboratory of Remote Sensing of Gansu Province, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 320 Donggang West Road, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
Jianhua Wang: Key Laboratory of Remote Sensing of Gansu Province, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 320 Donggang West Road, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
Xuegang Lu: Heihe River Bureau, No. 458 Qingyang Road, Lanzhou 730030, Gansu, China

Energies, 2015, vol. 8, issue 7, 1-18

Abstract: Ejin Oasis, located in the lower reaches of the Heihe River Basin (HRB), has experienced severe ecosystem decline between the 1960s and 1990s. In response, the Chinese Government implemented the Ecological Water Diversion Project (EWDP) in 2000. To evaluate the effects of the EWDP, this study monitored changes in land use and vegetation in the Ejin Oasis since 2000 and examined driving factors behind such changes. Results demonstrated that the Ejin Oasis ecosystem generally improved between 2000 and 2011. Water body area significantly increased. Lake area of once dried-up Sogo Nuur increased to 45 km 2 . Accordingly, vegetation cover restoration has also significantly increased. For example, the Seasonally Integrated Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (SINDVI) has shown that 31.18% of the entire study area experienced an increase in vegetation area. On the other hand, even though the EWDP has been successful in driving vegetation recovery and lake restoration, farmland reclamation has counteracted such restoration initiatives. Farmland area almost doubled between 2000 and 2011. Thus, farmland expansion management is necessary for the full restoration of the Ejin Oasis ecosystems as well as HRB sustainable development. The results of this study can provide a reference for the management of the HRB.

Keywords: land use change; SINDVI; EWDP; change detection; water resource management; sustainable development; Heihe River Basin (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/8/7/7040/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/8/7/7040/ (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:jeners:v:8:y:2015:i:7:p:7040-7057:d:52472

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

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