Elevated Risk of Ecological Land and Underlying Factors Associated with Rapid Urbanization and Overprotected Agriculture in Northeast China

Shuhan Liu, Dongyan Wang, Guoping Lei, Hong Li and Wenbo Li
Additional contact information
Shuhan Liu: Institute of Land Management, Northeastern University, 195 Chuangxin Road, Shenyang 110169, China
Dongyan Wang: College of Earth Sciences, Jilin University, 2199 Jianshe Street, Changchun 130061, China
Guoping Lei: Institute of Land Management, Northeastern University, 195 Chuangxin Road, Shenyang 110169, China
Hong Li: College of Earth Sciences, Jilin University, 2199 Jianshe Street, Changchun 130061, China
Wenbo Li: College of Earth Sciences, Jilin University, 2199 Jianshe Street, Changchun 130061, China

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 22, 1-18

Abstract: Ecological land with considerable ecological value can be regarded as an important indicator in guaranteeing ecosystem function and sustainable development. Generally, the urbanization process has been considered to be the primary factor affecting ecological land use. However, the influence of agricultural development, particularly in a typical farming area, has rarely been studied. In this paper, we present a method to assess the ecological risk of ecological land (ELER) in a black soil area in northeastern China. Furthermore, the underlying factors were detected using the geographically weighted regression model, which took into account conditions of natural elements, the urbanization process, and grain production conditions. The results indicate that ecological land experienced remarkable changes with an evident loss and decline from 1996–2015. The ELER progressively increased in the concentrated farming area and the western agro-pastoral ecotone, and the ecological land in the eastern forest area was always at a high risk level. According to the regression coefficients, the relationships between influence factors and ELER could be better explained by the variables of elevation, slope, proportion of rural residential area, and ratio of cultivated land area to residential area. To summarize, agricultural occupation and urban expansion were verified as the two main causes of ecological land loss, as well as elevated risks. In light of the current situation, measures such as policy adjustment and ecological restoration should be taken to avoid risk and optimize land use.

Keywords: ecological land; landscape ecological risk; urbanization; overprotected agriculture; northeast China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/22/6203/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/22/6203/ (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:11:y:2019:i:22:p:6203-:d:284089

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 ().