Spatial Distribution of Precise Suitability of Plantation: A Case Study of Main Coniferous Forests in Hubei Province, China

Yang Yi, Mingchang Shi, Jialin Liu, Chen Zhang, Xiaoding Yi, Sha Li, Chunyang Chen and Liangzhao Lin
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Yang Yi: Key Laboratory of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Ecological Landscaping of Challenging Urban Sites, National Innovation Alliance of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Afforestation and Landscaping of Challenging Urban Sites, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Landscaping on Challenging Urban Sites, Shanghai Academy of Landscape Architecture Science and Planning, Shanghai 200232, China
Mingchang Shi: Beijing Engineering Research Center of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China
Jialin Liu: Key Laboratory of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Ecological Landscaping of Challenging Urban Sites, National Innovation Alliance of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Afforestation and Landscaping of Challenging Urban Sites, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Landscaping on Challenging Urban Sites, Shanghai Academy of Landscape Architecture Science and Planning, Shanghai 200232, China
Chen Zhang: Shanghai Foundation Ding Environmental Technology Company, Shanghai 200063, China
Xiaoding Yi: Shanghai Foundation Ding Environmental Technology Company, Shanghai 200063, China
Sha Li: Beijing Engineering Research Center of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China
Chunyang Chen: Beijing Engineering Research Center of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China
Liangzhao Lin: College of Electronic and Information Engineering, Shanghai Dianji University, Shanghai 201306, China

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 5, 1-19

Abstract: (1) Background. Conifers are the main plantation species in southern China, including Masson Pine (MP), Chinese fir (CF) and Chinese thuja (CT). Clarifying the suitable site conditions for these conifers is helpful for large-area afforestation, so as to manage forests to provide a higher level of ecosystem services. To achieve the research goals, we take the conifers in Hubei Province of southern China as a case study. (2) Methods. The situations of conifers, as well as environmental conditions of 448 sampling plots, were then investigated. The suitable growth environment of conifers in the studied area was determined by the maximum entropy algorithm, and the suitability spatial distribution of coniferous forests at the provincial level was also analyzed. (3) Results. The effect of the conifers suitability prediction model reached an accurate level, where AUC values of MP, CF and CT training set were 0.828, 0.856 and 0.970, respectively. Among multiple environmental factors, such as geography and climate, altitude is the most important factor affecting conifer growth. The contribution of altitude to the growth suitability of MP, CF and CT was 38.1%, 36.2% and 36.1%, respectively. Suitable areas of MP, CF and CT were 97,400 ha, 74,300 ha and 39,900 ha, accounting for 52.45%, 39.97% and 21.46% of the studied area, respectively. We concluded that the suitable site conditions of conifer plantations were 2800–5600 °C annual accumulated temperature, 40–1680 m a.s.l., and <40° slopes. (4) Conclusions. The study suggests that accurate spatial suitability evaluation should be carried out to provide sufficient support for the large-area afforestation in southern China. However, due to our data and study area limitations, further studies are needed to explore the above findings for a full set of plantation species in an extensive area of southern China.

Keywords: plantations; coniferous forests; suitability; MaxEnt model; Hubei province (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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