Vegetation Dynamics Due to Urbanization in the Coastal Cities along the Maritime Silk Road

Min Yan, Shunxiang Fan, Li Zhang, Riffat Mahmood, Bowei Chen and Yuqi Dong
Additional contact information
Min Yan: Key Laboratory of Digital Earth Sciences, Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 9 Dengzhuang South Road, Beijing 100094, China
Shunxiang Fan: College of Resources and Environmental Sciences, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100193, China
Li Zhang: Key Laboratory of Digital Earth Sciences, Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 9 Dengzhuang South Road, Beijing 100094, China
Riffat Mahmood: Key Laboratory of Digital Earth Sciences, Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 9 Dengzhuang South Road, Beijing 100094, China
Bowei Chen: Key Laboratory of Digital Earth Sciences, Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 9 Dengzhuang South Road, Beijing 100094, China
Yuqi Dong: Key Laboratory of Digital Earth Sciences, Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 9 Dengzhuang South Road, Beijing 100094, China

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 2, 1-16

Abstract: Substantial research indicates the effects of urbanization on vegetation cover; however, a view of this scenario from a regional scale is absent. Nowadays, coastal cities have become the new engine for the development of countries in coastal areas. To capture the effects of rapid urbanization on vegetation dynamics, 35 coastal cities along the Maritime Silk Road (MSR) were selected to study the related research using quantitative tools. We calculated spatiotemporal trends of vegetation dynamics along an urban development intensity (UDI) gradient using the MODIS-enhanced vegetation index (EVI) during the period of 2000–2015. We found a significant reduction ( p < 0.05) in the EVI in the core area against that in the rural area (ΔEVI) of 14 cities and an insignificant change in vegetation in the peri-urban areas or urban outskirts. EVI decreased significantly along the UDI gradients in 12 coastal cities with a linear pattern and in seven coastal cities with a concave pattern; only Bangkok exhibited a convex pattern. The nonlinear pattern between the EVI and UDI reflected the fact that vegetation dynamics were affected by complicated factors, including climate change and human interventions, over a long period of time. In conclusion, our work provided a scientific reference for the sustainable development of coastal cities along the MSR; further work is necessary to explore the mechanic details of the positive and negative influences of urban factors and related policies on vegetation conditions.

Keywords: coastal cities; Maritime Silk Road; urbanization; urban development intensity (UDI) (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/11/2/164/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/11/2/164/ (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:jlands:v:11:y:2022:i:2:p:164-:d:729450

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

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