Assessment of land use change and potential eco-service value in the upper reaches of Minjiang River, China

Abstract

The remote sensing (RS) and geographical information system (GIS) technologies were adopted and a mathematic method was developed to evaluate the changes of ecosystem services in the upper reaches of Minjiang River-valley for providing advices to manage the ecosystem. The results showed that the land use change mainly occurred on forest, farmland and grassland. From 1986 to 1994, the area of farmland increased by 477% (60801 hm²), while the area of forest decreased by 4.97% (89012.17 hm²). From 1986 to 2000, the eco-service value of forest was degressive but that of farmland increased greatly as the increasing of planting area, while the total eco-service value decreased by 771.11×10⁸ yuan RMB due to the rapid increase of population in this region. The driving force of eco-service change was also discussed in the paper. The nation policy of Natural Forest Protection Project has taken effect in preventing the decline of eco-services.

Keywords

Upper reaches of Minjiang River / Land use / Ecosystem service / Remote sensing