Based on long-term measurement data of weather/ecological stations over China, this paper calculated and produced annually- and seasonally-averaged Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) spatial data from 1961 to 2007, using climatological calculations and spatialization techniques. The spatio-temporal variation characteristics of annually- and seasonally-averaged PAR spatial data over China in recent 50 years were analyzed with Mann-Kendall trend analysis method and GIS spatial analysis techniques. The results show that: (1) As a whole, the spatial distribution of PAR is complex and inhomogeneous across China, with lower PAR in the eastern and southern parts of China and higher PAR in the western part. Mean annual PAR over China ranges from 17.7 mol m-2 d-1 to 39.5 mol m-2 d-1. (2) Annually- and seasonally-averaged PAR of each pixel over China are averaged as a whole and the mean values decline visibly with fluctuant processes, and the changing rate of annually-averaged PAR is –0.138 mol m-2 d-1/10a. The changing amplitudes among four seasons are different, with maximum dropping in summer, and the descending speed of PAR is faster before the 1990s, after which the speed slows down. (3) The analysis by each pixel shows that PAR declines significantly (α=0.05) in most parts of China. Summer and winter play more important roles in the interannual variability of PAR. North China is always a decreasing zone in four seasons, while the northwest of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau turns to be an increasing zone in four seasons. (4) The spatial distributions of the interannual variability of PAR vary among different periods. The interannual variabilities of PAR in a certain region are different not only among four seasons, but also among different periods.
Based on the citrus temperature, precipitation, sunlight and climate risk degree, the article divides subtropics of China into three types: the low risk region, the moderate risk region and the high risk region. The citrus temperature risk increases with increasing latitude (except for the western mountainous area of subtropics of China). The citrus precipitation risk in the central part of subtropics of China is higher than that in the northern and western parts. The distributions of citrus sunlight risk are not consistent to those of the citrus precipitation risk. The citrus climate risk is mainly influenced by temperature. There is latitudinal zonal law for the distribution of the climate risk, that is, the climate risk increases with increasing latitude. At the same time the climate risk in mountainous area is high and that in eastern plain area is low. There are differences in the temporal and spatial changes of the citrus climate. In recent 46 years, the citrus climate risk presents a gradual increasing trend in subtropics of China, especially it has been increasing fast since the 1980s. Because of the global warming, the low risk region in the eastern and southern parts has a gradual decreasing trend, however, the high risk region in the northern and western parts has an increasing trend and the high risk region has been extending eastward and southward. The article analyses the distribution of the citrus climate risk degree of reduction rates of >10%, >20% and >30% in subtropics of China, and studies their changes in different time periods. Results show that the risk is increasing from southeast to northwest.
According to climate features and river runoff conditions, Xinjiang could be divided into three research areas: The Altay-Tacheng region, the Tianshan Mountain region and the northern slope of the Kunlun Mountains. Utilizing daily observations from 12 sounding stations and the annual runoff dataset from 34 hydrographical stations in Xinjiang for the period 1960–2002, the variance of the summertime 0℃ level height and the changing trends of river runoff are analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively, through trend contrast of curves processed by a 5-point smoothing procedure and linear correlation. The variance of the summertime 0℃ level height in Xinjiang correlates well with that of the annual river runoff, especially since the early 1990s, but it differs from region to region, with both the average height of the 0℃ level and runoff quantity significantly increasing over time in the Altay- Tacheng and Tianshan Mountain regions but decreasing on the northern slope of the Kunlun Mountains. The correlation holds for the whole of Xinjiang as well as the three individual regions, with a 0.01 significance level. This indicates that in recent years, climate change in Xinjiang has affected not only the surface layer but also the upper levels of the atmosphere, and this raising and lowering of the summertime 0℃ level has a direct impact on the warming and wetting process in Xinjiang and the amount of river runoff. Warming due to climate change increases the height of the 0℃ level, but also speeds up, ice-snow melting in mountain regions, which in turn increases river runoff, leading to a season of plentiful water instead of the more normal low flow period.
Response of the runoff in the headwater region of the Yellow River to climate change and its sensibility are analyzed based on the measured data at the four hydrological stations and ten weather stations during the period 1959-2008. The result indicates that change of temperature in the region has an obvious corresponding relationship with global warming and the changes of annual average temperature in each subregion in the region have been presenting a fluctuant and rising state in the past 50 years. However the change of precipitation is more intricate than the change of temperature in the region because of the influences of the different geographical positions and environments in various areas, and the change of annual precipitation in the main runoff-producing area has been presenting a fluctuant and decreasing state in the past 50 years. And there is a remarkable nonlinear correlativity between runoff and precipitation and temperature in the region. The runoff in the region has been decreasing continuously since 1990 because the precipitation in the main runoff- producing area obviously decreases and the annual average temperature continuously rises. As a whole, the runoff in each subregion of the headwater region of the Yellow River is quite sensitive to precipitation change, while the runoff in the subregion above Jimai is more sensitive to temperature change than that in the others in the region, correspondingly.
Global climate change has significant impacts on agricultural production. Future climate change will bring important influences to the food security. The CERES-Wheat model was used to simulate the winter wheat growing process and production in Panzhuang Irrigation District (PID) during 2011–2040 under B2 climate scenario based on the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) assumptions with the result of RCMs (Regional Climate Models) projections by PRECIS (Providing Regional Climates for Impacts Studies) system introduced to China from the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research. The CERES-Wheat model was calibrated and validated with independent field-measured growth data in 2002–2003 and 2007–2008 growing season under current climatic conditions at Yucheng Comprehensive Experimental Station (YCES), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). The results show that a significant impact of climate change on crop growth and yield was noted in the PID study area. Average temperature at Yucheng Station rose by 0.86℃ for 1961–2008 in general. Under the B2 climate scenario, average temperature rose by 0.55℃ for 2011–2040 compared with the baseline period (1998–2008), which drastically shortened the growth period of winter-wheat. However, as the temperature keep increasing after 2030, the top-weight and yield of the winter wheat will turn to decrease. The simulated evapotranspiration shows an increasing trend, although it is not very significant, during 2011–2040. Water use efficiency will increase during 2011–2031, but decrease during 2031–2040. The results indicate that climate change enhances agricultural production in the short-term, whereas continuous increase in temperature limits crop production in the long-term.
Rural hollowing is a recent geographic phenomenon that has received significant attention in China, which is experiencing rapid urbanization. It has led to the wasteful use of rural land resources, and imposed obstacles on the optimization of land use and coordinated urban-rural development. Rural hollowing has various forms of manifestation, which refers to the neglect and vacancy of rural dwellings, both of which can lead to damage and ultimate abandonment of rural dwellings. Damaged dwellings have different degrees of destruction, ranging from slight, moderate to severe. The evolutive process of rural hollowing in general has five stages, i.e., emergence, growth, flourishing, stability, and decline. Based on the combination of both regional economic development level and its physiographic features, the types of rural hollowing can be categorised as urban fringe, plain agricultural region, hilly agricultural region, and agro-pastoral region. Especially, the plain agricultural region is the most typical one in rural hollowing, which shows the spatial evolution of rural hollowing as a “poached egg” pattern with a layered hollow core and solid shape. Furthermore, the driving forces behind rural hollowing are identified as the pull of cities and push of rural areas. In particular, this paper identifies contributors to rural hollowing that include rural depopulation in relation to rapid urbanisation and economic change, land ownership and land use policy, and institutional barriers.
This paper analyzed forest land use change in Trans-Boundary Laos–China Biodiversity Conservation Area which is called Namha National Biodiversity Conservation Areas (Namha NBCAs), with 1992 and 2002 TM (ETM). Based on GIS and statistical methods, the intensity, state index of land use change and transfer matrix were used to study spatio- temporal land use change in the region. The results showed that the area of forest land decreased greatly, also the area of bamboo and grassland decreased. The other way round, the area of unstocked forest, slash and burn and rice paddy land increased. As a whole, the intensity of forest land change was higher, but others were lower. From the transfer matrix, most of the forest land changed into unstocked forest and urban area, some to slash and burn. The grassland and bamboo were mainly transferred to forest and unstocked forest. The unstocked forest land mostly came from forest land and grassland. It was showed there were three main causes of the land use change namely: opium poppy cultivation, rubber plantation and also ecotourism activities and finally some policies were developed in order to address the land use change in the study areas.
Land use change is the result of the interplay between socioeconomic, institutional and environmental factors, and has important impacts on the functioning of socioeconomic and environmental systems with important tradeoffs for sustainability, food security, biodiversity and the vulnerability of people and ecosystems to global change impacts. Based on the results of the First Land Use Survey in Tibet Autonomous Region carried out in the late 1980s, land use map of Lhasa area in 1990 was compiled for the main agricultural area in Lhasa valley using aerial photos obtained in April, May and October 1991 and Landsat imagery in the late 1980s and 1991 as remotely sensed data sources. Using these remotely sensed data, the land use status of Lhasa area in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1999 and 2000 were mapped through updating annual changes of cultivated land, artificial forest, grass planting, grassland restoration, and residential area and so on. Land use map for Lhasa area in 2007 was made using ALOS AVNIR-2 composite images acquired on October 24 and December 26, 2007 through updating changes of main land use types. According to land use status of Lhasa area in 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2007, the spatial and temporal land use dynamics in Lhasa area from 1990 to 2007 are further analyzed using GIS spatial models in this paper.
Land pressure and adaptation are the main factors determining environmental degradation in most of China’s mountainous regions. Little attention so far has been paid to the adaptation strategies based on evaluation of land pressure in these regions. We evaluated the grain production pressure and economic development pressure for 21 small watersheds undergoing soil conservation measures in the northern mountainous region of China, compared the evaluation results with actual production for each of the watersheds, and analyzed the adaptation strategies. The results imply that land pressure was spatially heterogeneous among the sample watersheds, but there was a balancing trend between land pressure and productive capacity for each watershed. Under rising pressure, these watersheds developed a variety of adaptation strategies such as labor migration, increasing fruit and nut production, and expanding rural tourism if possible. These strategies result from evolution of the market economy in China, and persistent development of the national economy determines the variation of environment in these mountainous regions.
Based on sediment and discharge flux data for the Yellow River, realistic forcing fields and bathymetry of the Bohai Sea, a suspended sediment transport module is driven by a wave-current coupled model to research seasonal variations and mechanisms of suspended load transport to the Bohai Sea. It could be concluded that surface sediment concentration indicates a distinct spatial distribution characteristic that varies seasonally in the Bohai Sea. Sediment concentration is rather high near the Yellow River estuary, seasonal variations of which are controlled by quantity of sediment from the Yellow River, suspended sediment concentration reaches its maximum during summer and fall. Furthermore, sediment concentration decreases rapidly in other seas far from the Yellow River estuary and maintains a very low level in the center of the Bohai Sea, and is dominated by seasonal variations of climatology wind field in the Bohai Sea. Only a small amount of sediments imported from the Yellow River are delivered northwestward to the southern coast of the Bohai Bay. Majority of sediments are transported southeastward to the Laizhou Bay, where sediments are continuously delivered into the center of the Bohai Sea in a northeastward direction, and part of them are transported eastward alongshore through the Bohai Strait. 69% of sediments from the Yellow River are deposited near the river delta, 31% conveyed seaward, within which, 4% exported to the northern Yellow Sea through the Bohai Strait. Wind wave is the most essential contributor to seasonal variations of sediment concentration in the Bohai Sea, and the contribution of tidal currents is also significant in shallow waters when wind speed is low.
Semi-arid and arid areas exhibit great temporal variability in water availability. In some of these regions, a one- or two-day rainfall is followed by intervening dry periods of variable length. In recent decades, many rivers of the semi-arid portion of the Jequitinhonha Basin have been undergoing a progressive discharge reduction, mainly of their base flow, the Araçuaí River is one of them. In order to understand this transformation, a long-term analysis of the annual water balance of the Araçuaí River Basin was performed, the results of which are presented herein. Satellite images, hydrometeorological and river discharge data were analyzed; mean and variance tests were conducted to determine temporal homogeneity. Historical pluviometric data analysis shows no corresponding precipitation reduction and temperature undergoes only a slight increase in the same period. On the other hand, evaporation is extremely high, higher than precipitation during most of the year, leaving almost no water for infiltration (aquifer recharge) and runoff. Furthermore, the Araçuaí headwaters of its tributaries are now occupied by a monoculture, Eucaliptus sp., used for paper production. Because of the decreased fluvial discharges, its lowlands, usually used for agriculture and pasture, are abandoned and partially eroded.
Taking the Chaohe River Basin above the Miyun Reservoir in North China as a study area, the characteristics and variation trends of annual runoff and annual precipitation during 1961–2005 were analyzed applying Mann-Kendall test method on the basis of the hydrologic data of the major hydrological station (Xiahui Station) located at the outlet of the drainage basin and the meteorological data of 17 rainfall stations. Human activities including water conservancy projects construction and water diversion as well as implementation of soil and water conservation from 1961 to 2005 were carefully studied using time series contrasting method. The referenced period (1961–1980) that influenced slightly by human activities and the compared period (1981–2005) that influenced significantly by water conservancy and soil conservation measures were identified according to the runoff variation process analysis and abrupt change points detection during 1961–2005 applying double accumulative curve method, mean shift t-test method and Mann-Kendall mutation test technique. Based on the establishment of a rainfall-runoff empirical statistical model, impacts and the runoff-reducing effects of water conservancy and soil conservation measures on runoff reduction were evaluated quantitatively. The major results could be summarized as follows: (1) The annual precipitation in the drainage basin tends to decrease while the runoff has declined markedly since the 1960s, the average annual runoff from 1991 to 2000 was only 90.9% in proportion to that from 1961 to 1970. (2) The annual runoff variations in the drainage basin are significantly related to human activities. (3) During 1981–1990, 1991–2000, 2001–2005 and 1981–2005, the average annual runoff reduction amounts were 1.15×108, 0.28×108, 1.10×108 and 0.79×108 m3 respectively and the average annual runoff-reducing effects were 31.99%, 7.13%, 40.71% and 23.79% accordingly. Runoff-reducing effects by water conservancy and soil conservation measures are more prominent in the low water period.
