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Journal of Geographical Sciences >

2023 , Vol. 33 >Issue 3: 639 - 654

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11442-023-2099-5

Research Articles

How to promote the green development of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau?

  • FANG Chuanglin , 1, 2
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  • 1. Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, Beijing 100101, China
  • 2. College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China

Fang Chuanglin (1966-), PhD and Professor, specialized in urban geography, urban agglomeration development, and resource and environmental effects of urbanization. E-mail:

Received date: 2022-11-20

  Accepted date: 2022-12-30

  Online published: 2023-03-21

Supported by

Innovation Research Group Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China(42121001)

The Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research Program(2019QZKK1005)

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Abstract

Urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau is a part of the strategies to strengthen China’s national security shield as well as to enhance its national ecological safety barrier and the “water tower” of Asia. It also plays an irreplaceable role in protecting one of the last unspoiled regions in the world, ensuring that the “third pole” achieves modernization in step with the rest of China, and improving the lives of all ethnic groups that live in “roof of the world.” This study discusses in detail the distinctive drivers, development path, development goals, development dynamic, and green development model and strategy of the new type of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau, which differs markedly from the rest of China. This author asserts that urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau should involve low-intensity development, cultural transmission, protection of land and borders, conservation of water resources, small concentrations and wide dispersion of the population, social inclusivity, and improvements to the environment that benefit the people, driven by domestic investment, tourism, services, and paired assistance. The plans for the region’s future development are as follows. In terms of the protection of land and borders, the Tibetan Plateau will safeguard China’s national security with fast and stable development and ensure sufficient populations inhabit border and rural areas. By 2035, the permanent population of the plateau will be 16 million, and the level of urbanization will reach 52.5%, with stability in the middle stage of urbanization, thereby comprehensively improving the quality of urbanization. In terms of green development, it is necessary to improve the quality of ecological products and the capacity and level of ecological services, accentuate local features and folk customs, promote culture, and encourage people to tend livestock in rural areas and live in towns, thereby creating beautiful cities and towns in the Tibetan Plateau. In terms of the small concentrations and wide dispersion of the population, the overall urban pattern will be “three clusters, four belts, and multiple nodes.” The “three clusters” are the Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam metropolitan areas; the “four belts” are along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, the Ancient Tang (China)-Tibet Road, and border areas; and “multiple nodes” refers to major urban nodes and border towns. In terms of ensuring connectivity, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway was completed ahead of schedule, national security lines are being strengthened, and new infrastructure and smart cities are being built. Additionally, the land system of border cities is being reformed, a special zone for experimental border land reform is being constructed, and border towns are being prioritized in national strategies and territorial space planning.

Key words： urbanization process; special missions; drivers and ideas; green development; Tibetan Plateau

Cite this article

FANG Chuanglin . How to promote the green development of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau?[J]. Journal of Geographical Sciences, 2023 , 33(3) : 639 -654 . DOI: 10.1007/s11442-023-2099-5

1 Introduction

The Tibetan Plateau is China’s national security shield and its ecological security barrier, leading some people to ask, should the “roof of the world” be urbanized? How did the 17 cities and 476 towns in the Tibetan Plateau develop? What forces drive the development and expansion of cities in the Tibetan Plateau? How big will these cities grow in the future? Are there early warning signs and can it be controlled? How can urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau protect Asia’s water tower and China’s national ecological safety barrier and national security shield? Will urbanization make the Tibetan Plateau more beautiful and improve the standard of living of the people who live there? With these scientific issues in mind, this author has visited the Tibetan Plateau on several occasions for a total of more than 140 days since 2019, collecting first-hand data for a database on urbanization in the region and systematically analyzing the features, dynamic evolution, and spatiotemporal evolution of the Tibetan Plateau’s urbanization. I have also used various models to calculate the carrying capacity of green urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau and highlighted the exceptional missions and distinctive path, objectives, and dynamic of the Tibetan Plateau’s green urbanization, as well as its development path and countermeasures. This study provides scientific support for the green urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau and basically achieving the region’s modernization in step with the rest of the country by 2035.
A review of the existing literature from China and abroad on human activities and urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau reveals that modern Homo sapiens began to explore the hinterland of the Tibetan Plateau 30,000-40,000 years ago (Chen et al., 2022). Researchers have adopted various perspectives in their analysis of the region. Some have analyzed the principles governing regional differentiation of population and the spatiotemporal evolution of urban and rural settlements using the four dimensions of longitude, latitude, polarity and verticality, which have shown that the Tibetan Plateau is sparsely populated and that its population density is greater in the southeast and lower in the northwest (Qi et al., 2020) and that rural settlements on the Tibetan Plateau increased between 1980 and 2015, mainly in eastern and southern parts of Qinghai Province and southern Tibet (Bao et al., 2019; Li et al., 2021). A study measured the intensity of human activities in the Tibetan Plateau from 1990 to 2010 in terms of land use/cover, population density, road distribution, and grazing density, which showed that the region was relatively undisturbed by human activities, but that disturbance has gradually increased over time (Li et al., 2018). Human footprint analysis was used to show that the main divers of the increase in human activity intensity in Tibet between 1990 and 2010 were livestock grazing and road construction (Li et al., 2018). Other researchers have used big data, such as cell phone location and population migration data, to analyze spatiotemporal changes to population in the Tibetan Plateau during the National Day (October 1st) holiday at the provincial, municipal, and fine grid scales, which have shown that spatiotemporal patterns of human activities vary significantly between peak and off-peak tourist seasons (Yi et al., 2019; Xu et al., 2020).
In terms of the drivers and spatial layout of urbanization, the main driver is top-down government investment, with diversifying investment entities in emerging markets (Fu, 2000); non-agricultural employment is the main driver of urbanization, while natural factors have a relatively insignificant restrictive effect (Qi, 2019); educational level, income, medical insurance, and level of social integration affect willingness to live in cities and towns among the floating population in the Tibetan Plateau, as do the economic development level and natural conditions of the target location; the spatial distribution of cities and towns in the Tibetan Plateau can be characterized as “dense in the southeast and sparse in the northwest,” with small concentrations and wide dispersion, but with an agglomeration trend over time (Bao et al., 2019). The Qaidam Basin in western Qinghai Province is a high-level urban agglomeration, while the Qiangtang area is a low-level urban agglomeration area. Counties and cities where prefecture-level administrative centers are located tend to have high levels of urbanization, but surrounding areas have low levels of urbanization (Liu et al., 2021). Using nighttime light intensity to analyze the size of Tibetan Plateau cities, it was found that the small size of the highest-level cities is an impediment to the development of the region’s urban system (Huang et al., 2021).
In terms of analysis of the impact of urbanization on the ecological environment, a study showed the impact of agricultural modernization, industrialization, and urbanization on the value of ecological services in the Tibetan Plateau during the period 2000-2018, with urbanization reducing the overall interference of human activities on the ecosystem, industrialization exerting very little pressure on the ecosystem, and an expanding negative impact from agricultural modernization on ecological spaces (Tian et al., 2021). From 2012 to 2016, environmental stress in the process of urbanization and industrialization in the Sanjiangyuan (“source of three rivers”) area displayed a “point-like” spatial effect, agricultural and animal husbandry production displayed a “planar-like” stress, and tourism and transportation displayed a “linear-shaped” stress (Zhou et al., 2021). Coupling and coordination between urbanization and the ecological environment in the Tibetan Plateau is increasing overall at various scales, and it is expected to continue to increase in the coming decade, but the rate of growth varies significantly among regions (Feng et al., 2020). Over the past 30 years, climate change and the intensification of human activities have exerted pressures on lake areas in the Tibetan Plateau, with rapid urbanization and economic development playing a decisive role in water pollution, so pollution control policies urgently need to be included in development plans of the region’s lake areas (Wu et al., 2021).
In summary, there have been relatively few studies on human activities and urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau. With the implementation of the Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research Program over the past five years, research has gradually increased, and big data and modern technology have been applied to the development of regional urbanization research. For data on the spatial extent of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau, this study used the Integration dataset of Tibetan Plateau boundary shared by the National Tibetan Plateau Data Center, with data from the latest version of the TPBoundary_new (2021) (Zhang et al., 2021). The area is approximately 2.5809 million km2, accounting for 83.7% of the total area of the Tibetan Plateau and 26.9% of the total land area of China, with an average altitude of approximately 4400 m. Administratively, it encompasses the Tibet and Xinjiang autonomous regions as well as Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan, and Yunnan provinces, two provincial capitals, six prefecture-level cities, nine county-level cities, 15 municipal districts, 131 counties, eight autonomous counties, and one administrative council (Figure 1). The main research focus is the whole of Tibet and Qinghai, which together account for 60.6% of the total area of the Tibetan Plateau. According to the results of the seventh national census in 2020, the permanent population of the Tibetan Plateau was 13.134 million, which is 0.91% of the total population of China.
Figure 1 Spatial range of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau

2 The distinctive strategic position, mission and process of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau

2.1 The distinctive strategic position of plateau urbanization

In terms of analysis of the distinctive strategic position of the Tibetan Plateau in China’s national urbanization plans, the region’s urbanized areas are on the periphery of China’s new-type urbanization framework consisting of two horizontal axes (the east-to-west land bridges and the Yangtze River) and three vertical axes (China’s coastline, the Beijing-Harbin and Beijing-Guangzhou railways, and the Baotou-Kunming Railway) as well as 19 urban agglomerations (Fang et al., 2018). Despite not being a core part of China’s new-type urbanization, the urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau encompasses the exceptional missions of strengthening China’s national security shield and national ecological safety barrier as well as Asia’s water tower, so it holds a very important and distinctive strategic role in the national urbanization strategy. It also plays an irreplaceable and vital role in protecting the last unspoiled region in the world, building a beautiful Tibetan Plateau, improving the lives of the people of all ethnic groups that live there, and strengthening China’s ecological security barrier and the national security shield.
Analysis of the strategic position of the Tibetan Plateau in China’s urbanization zoning revealed that, in terms of the 5 main regions and 47 sub-regions of the new-type urbanization in China, the Tibetan Plateau comprises linked poverty alleviation urbanization development regions (IV) and ethnic autonomous urbanization development regions (V) (Fang et al., 2015; 2017). Accelerating the green development of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau and improving its quality is essential for promoting the integration of urbanization in ethnic areas with the national new-type urbanization development pattern, achieving green urbanization with Chinese characteristics and the characteristics of the Tibetan Plateau, and exploring a version of the construction of a beautiful China for the Tibetan Plateau and a path for achieving the construction of a beautiful Tibetan Plateau. It is also essential for ensuring social stability and long-term peace and stability in ethnic border areas, as well as making invaluable and important contributions to the construction of an urban system in the Tibetan Plateau that protects China’s borders and the optimization of the national urbanization strategy (Fang et al., 2016).

2.2 National strategic needs for urbanization

Urbanization is the most intense human activity in the Tibetan Plateau. It is also the only way for the plateau to modernize in step with the rest of China. In June and July 2021, when Chinese President Xi Jinping inspected Qinghai and Tibet, he repeatedly emphasized the four major issues of stability, development, ecology, and border security and the need to advance ecological protection and sustainable development in the region for the sake of long-term stability and high-quality development. He stressed the need to prioritize the environment, pursue green development, modernize in a way that maintains harmony between humans and nature, and protect the environment of Earth’s “third pole.” Thus, green development in the Tibetan Plateau means implementing President Xi’s instructions to “protect the world’s last unspoiled region, build a beautiful Tibetan Plateau, and improve the lives of the people of all ethnic groups there.” It is a concrete action plan to incorporate green development and high-quality development in every aspect of urbanization and urban construction. The green development of urbanization shoulders the exceptional missions of safeguarding China’s national security shield and its ecological security barrier as well as Asia’s water tower from instability and imbalance, and the transmission of traditional Chinese culture. These exceptional missions define the strategic importance of new-type urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau. It plays a vital role in the development of China’s national security shield, ecological security barrier, strategic resource reserve bases, local agricultural products bases, Chinese cultural protection sites, and tourism destinations with global appeal as well as protecting the last unspoiled region in the world. Urbanization has made the lives of people in the Tibetan Plateau better, strengthened the region’s role as an ecological security barrier, and strengthened China’s ability to defend its borders. Therefore, there are distinctive motivations and a distinctive development path to urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau that differ entirely from the rest of China (Fang et al., 2015).

2.3 The exceptional missions of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau

The following are the exceptional missions of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau: to safeguard China’s national security shield and ecological security barrier as well as Asia’s water tower from instability and imbalance, transmit traditional Chinese culture, and ensure that the people who live in the Tibetan Plateau achieve modernization in step with the rest of China. These exceptional missions frame the distinctive drivers, path, objectives, and model of new-type urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau. The distinctive objectives of green urbanization in the region are to steadily enter, and maintain long-term stability in, the middle stage of urbanization, to comprehensively improve the quality of urbanization, to improve the lives of people living in the Tibetan Plateau through urbanization, to strengthen the region’s role as an ecological security barrier, and enhance China’s ability to defend its borders.

2.4 The distinctive drivers of urbanization

The urbanization process in the Tibetan Plateau is driven by distinctive natural, economic, social, cultural, and policy factors that differ entirely from those in the rest of China (Figure 2). It is a form of urbanization characterized by low-intensity development, social inclusivity, cultural transmission, and border security that is driven by domestic investment, tourism, services, and paired assistance. In theory, it is a gradual, high-quality form of green urbanization. This distinctive urbanization process is manifested in its active adaptation to the fragile, high-altitude, cold, and oxygen-deprived environment of the Tibetan Plateau, the safeguarding of the water tower, the protection of border security, the focus on services and tourism, the reliance on domestic investment, the emphasis on gradual change, the approach of small concentrations and wide dispersion of the population, the integration of ethnic groups, the transmission of cultural values, the promotion of paired assistance, and the focus on improving the ecological environment for the benefit of the people.
Figure 2 Framework of special driving processes of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau

3 Principles and patterns of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau

3.1 Current status and issues of green urbanization

In the 67 years from 1953 to 2020, the permanent population of the Tibetan Plateau grew slowly, from 4,543,800 to 13,134,000 (Figure 3 and Table 1), giving an average annual increase of 128,200. In the 38 years from 1982 to 2020, the permanent urban population increased from 1,265,100 to 6,247,900, giving an annual increase of 131,100. The level of urbanization of permanent residents increased from 15% in 1982 to 47.58% in 2020, and the 2020 level was 16.22 percentage points lower than the national average. The average annual increase in the level of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau was 0.86 percentage points, which was lower than the national average of 1.15 percentage points for the same period.
Figure 3 Changes of total resident population and urbanization level in the Tibetan Plateau, 1953-2020
Table 1 Changes to population and urbanization indicators in the Tibetan Plateau, 1982-2020
Year 1982 1990 2000 2010 2020 Average annual
increase (%)
Number of cities and towns 86 108 212 350 493 4.70
Permanent population (millions) 8.43 9.59 10.67 12.24 13.13 1.17
Permanent residents as a proportion of
national population (%)		 0.82 0.83 0.82 0.89 0.91 0.27
Average annual population growth relative to previous census period (%) 2.83 1.62 1.07 1.39 0.70 -3.61
Urban population (millions) 1.26 1.82 2.55 4.07 6.25 4.30
Urbanization level (%) 15.0 18.96 23.92 33.23 47.58 3.08
Population density (persons/km2) 3.82 4.35 4.84 5.55 5.95 1.17
The following are the main challenges facing urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau. There are few towns and cities, and they have small populations. Towns with a permanent population of less than 10,000 people account for more than 84.38% of the total towns in the region. The urbanization level is low, so urban areas tend to have single functions and have little influence on surrounding areas, and urban infrastructure is underdeveloped. Urbanization is largely driven by migration, with little endogenous economic momentum. The development potential of ecological services is huge, but ecological value is difficult to realize, and there is insufficient industrial support. In 2020, the GDP of Tibet was 190.274 billion yuan and that of Qinghai was 300.592 billion yuan, ranking bottom and second bottom among China’s 31 provinces, autonomous regions, and directly administered municipalities. Per capita GDP was 54,277 yuan and 49,454 yuan respectively, well below the national average of 72,568 yuan. The population of border areas has decreased sharply, and there has been a lack of development of border towns, including towns for boosting border security. Plateau culture emphasizes development over transmission and protection, sightseeing over experience, and foreign aid over endogenous growth. As a result, the distinctive features of cultural towns are not being highlighted and intrinsic functions are underdeveloped. The ecological environment of high-density urban areas is being degraded, while ecological protection in low-density areas entails great cost. The lack of emphasis on the living environment in the region has meant that towns look very similar, and they lack certain public and social services. The Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam metropolitan areas have poor urban integration and weak radial development effects.

3.2 Distinctive green urbanization path

The distinctive green urbanization path of the Tibetan Plateau is guided by territorial and border security, guarantees the construction of transit routes, features cultural transmission, and foc uses on improving the living environment. This distinctive path is a necessary path for the people of the Tibetan Plateau to achieve modernization in step with the rest of the country. This special path requires the full implementation of President Xi Jinping’s important instructions on Tibet, Qinghai, Sichuan, and Yunnan, as well as his important expositions on work related to Tibet, focusing on the four major issues of “stability, development, ecology, and border security.” Based on the new development stage of the Tibetan Plateau, it is necessary to adhere to the path of prioritizing the environment and implementing green development, pursue the promotion of urbanization and green development, create a new development dynamic, and coordinate green development and national security. It is necessary to focus on safeguarding national security and Asia’s water tower and strengthening national unity in the course of urbanization in the plateau. It is necessary to make improving people’s lives and uniting the people the start and end points of high-quality socioeconomic development on the plateau. It is necessary to continuously improve the living standards of people who live in the Tibetan Plateau, ensure the region’s environment is sound, strengthen border defense and security, and strive to build a new modern socialist region that is unified, affluent, civilized, harmonious, and beautiful.

3.3 The carrying capacity threshold and target of urbanization

From the perspectives of population growth, the carrying capacities of the economy, land, water resources, atmospheric environment, ecosystem, and resource environment, a multi-model algorithm was used to calculate the population carrying capacity and urbanization level threshold of the Tibetan Plateau.*（* Fang Chuanglin et al., 2021. Research Report on the Population and Big City Carrying Capacity of the Tibetan Plateau.） It was concluded that the carrying capacity threshold for the permanent population in the Tibetan Plateau is about 26.2 million, so it can still increase by 13.07 million. A total of 15.00 million people could be allowed to move to cities while having a sufficient population to defend territory and live in border areas. Compared with the current urban population of 6.25 million in 2020, the Tibetan Plateau could increase its urban population by 8.75 million in the future. Based on the particularities of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau, combined with the calculation of the population size that could be allowed to move to urban areas, the urbanization rate of the Tibetan Plateau could increase to 57.25%, meaning it will be in the middle stage of urbanization for a long time, which would ensure it accords with the objective principles of the region’s urbanization. Thus, compared with the current urbanization level of 47.58% in 2020, the Tibetan Plateau can increase urbanization by 9.67 percentage points in the future.
Based on the urbanization carrying capacity, the urbanization of the plateau will steadily enter the middle stage of urbanization in the future and remain there for a long time to comprehensively improve the quality of urbanization. Urbanization will improve the lives of people who live in the region, strengthen the ecological security barrier, and strengthen border defense and security. Due to the special missions urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau shoulders and the resource and environmental carrying capacities, at least 40% of the population will live in rural areas for a long time. This will maintain the livelihoods of farmers and herders and revitalize the countryside as well as ensure strong border security.

3.4 Distinctive concepts of green urbanization

Based on the stage characteristics of urbanization and socioeconomic development, natural and geographical resource conditions, and the particularities of border ethnic minority areas in the Tibetan Plateau, it is necessary to highlight regional, ethnic, and cultural characteristics to urbanize the roof of the world; adhere to the basic principles of being people-oriented, optimizing the layout, raising ecological awareness, and passing on basic cultural principles; adhere to the core concept of urbanization of people who live on the Tibetan Plateau; promote the orderly transfer of farmers and herders to urban areas; build a more equitable social security system; ensure that people of all ethnic groups share in the fruits of modern civilization and reform and development; and actively yet steadily promote green urbanization that accords with local conditions. The specific concepts are as follows. (1) To safeguard national security, green urbanization should be implemented quickly yet steadily so as to ensure sufficient populations in border and rural areas. (2) There should be an appropriate balance between population concentration and dispersion, with small concentrations and wide dispersion. Population concentrations should be created where it is appropriate, and people should remain dispersed where it is needed, in order to form an urban system that strengthens border security. In particular, population concentrations should be encouraged in the Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam metropolitan areas as well as areas along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, the Ancient Tang-Tibet Road, and border areas. In the future, the population of small towns and villages will account for more than 50% of the permanent population of the Tibetan Plateau. (3) People will live in towns, herd in rural areas, get jobs locally, and live in nearby towns. (4) Green urbanization will highlight local characteristics and folk customs, promote culture, focus on connecting with local people, and build beautiful cities and towns in the region.

3.5 Spatial pattern of green urbanization

Between 1990 and 2020, the number of towns and cities in the Tibetan Plateau increased from 108 to 493. Specifically, the number of cities increased from 9 to 17, and the number of towns increased from 99 to 476. Urban areas with a population of less than 10,000 account for a large proportion of such towns, but their smaller urban populations mean that they have a weak radial or driving effect. If we divide the urban population of the Tibetan Plateau between 1990 and 2020 into six levels, we see that the number of towns with less than 10,000 people increased from 89 to 416, while the proportion such urban areas changed from 82.41% to 84.38%; cities and towns with 10,000-50,000 people increased from 14 to 67, while their proportion changed from 12.96% to 13.59%; the number of cities and towns with 50,000-100,000 people increased from 3 to 5, while the proportion changed from 2.78% to 1.01%; the number of towns with 100,000-200,000 people increased from 1 to 2, and their proportion changed from 0.93% to 0.41%; the number of towns with 200,000-500,000 people increased from 0 to 2 (Lhasa and Haidong), accounting for 0.41%; and the number of towns with more than 500,000 people is 1 (Xining), accounting for 0.41%. The function types of cities and towns in the Tibetan Plateau include comprehensive services, tourism services, industrial and mining services, agricultural and animal husbandry services, transportation and logistics, business services, border port, and suburban economy. Cities and towns have various specialized functions depending on their locations, transportation, and other factors.
After nearly 70 years of development, the Tibetan Plateau has a new basic spatial structure of urbanization for border security consisting of “three clusters, four belts and multiple nodes” (Figure 4). The “three clusters” are the Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam metropolitan areas. The “four belts” refer to urban areas along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, the Ancient Tang-Tibet Road, and border areas. The “multiple nodes” refer to important urban nodes and important border towns, including Haidong, Shigatse, Qamdo, Nyingchi, Lhoka, Nagqu, Golmud, Delingha, Yushu, Mangya, Tongren, Shangri-La, Kangding, Malkang, and Hezuo. These cities are regional central cities and are important support points for promoting high-quality socioeconomic development and ensuring border security.
Figure 4 Spatial pattern of urbanization for border security with a pattern of “three clusters, four belts, and multiple nodes” in the Tibetan Plateau

4 Green development paths and countermeasures for the urbanization of the Tibetan Plateau

4.1 Green development path of plateau urbanization

Based on the distinctive status, missions, and path of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau, it is necessary to implement urbanization that enhances border security, green development, protects the region’s status as Asia’s water tower, transmits local culture, attracts tourists, encourages people to live in towns and herd in rural areas, improves the ecological environment for the benefit of the people, leads to small concentrations and dispersed population, encourages paired assistance, and promotes urban-rural integration (Figure 5).
Figure 5 Framework of green development path of urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau
(1) It is necessary to implement an urbanization path that strengthens territorial and border security. It should strengthen the construction of border ports and border towns, optimize and upgrade border traffic, create a “comb-shaped” pattern of towns and villages for border security in the Tibetan Plateau, and develop characteristic towns and villages that strengthen and defend China’s borders; vigorously develop eco-tourism and ensure a suitable level of tourism in border areas; guide locally registered households to settle and consolidate border areas; and pursue a path of urbanization that enhances territorial and border security.
(2) It is necessary to implement green urbanization and green modernization. The aim is to construct a system of green integrated urban-rural development; continuously improve ecological products and ecological services; treat ecological value as the core value of high-quality development in the Tibetan Plateau; promote the coordinated development of urbanization and the ecological environment; explore ecological urbanization in line with regional characteristics; improve the living environment in ways that accentuate local features, and make up for shortcomings in the construction of the living environment; create plateau “park cities”; build the Tibetan Plateau into a pioneering location in terms of improving the ecological environment for the benefit of the people; and develop demonstration cities and towns that have improved their ecological environment to benefit locals. It is also necessary to make the Tibetan Plateau self-sufficient rather than dependent on outside assistance, to formulate a plan for the green modernization of the Tibetan Plateau, and to develop cities and key towns into pioneering demonstration zones for green modernization of the Tibetan Plateau.
(3) With a focus on increasing the number of urban residents, it is necessary to implement low-speed and high-quality urbanization. It is necessary to control the level and speed of urbanization at a reasonable level in accordance with the requirements of safeguarding national security and ecological security; make small towns the main focus of efforts to increase urban residents and encourage farmers and herdsmen near county towns and small towns to live in urban areas, in order to improve the quality of urbanization; and focus on building “small but beautiful, refined, and distinctive” urban chains along borders, communication lines, and rivers to ensure that rural areas and border areas have sufficient people to safeguard territory and borders.
(4) With cultural transmission as a priority, it is necessary to implement cultural urbanization. It is necessary to strengthen the protection and transmission of famous historical and cultural cities and towns in the plateau region; formulate protection plans for famous historical and cultural cities and towns; improve the protection system for historical and cultural cities and towns; increase funds, personnel, and technical support for the protection and development of famous historical and cultural cities and towns; and pursue cultural urbanization.
(5) It is necessary to make breakthroughs in the urbanization of key metropolitan areas. The aim is to accelerate the integration of the Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam metropolitan areas, build high-quality metropolitan areas and high-quality living spaces; promote the integrated development of Xining and Haidong to build the largest, strongest and most optimal urban cluster on the Tibetan Plateau; promote the integration of Lhasa and Shannan to build the most culturally attractive urban cluster in the region; and accelerate the integration of green industries and the circular economy in the Qaidam metropolitan area to build China’s second renewable energy demonstration zone.

4.2 Countermeasures for green urbanization

(1) Build infrastructure such as the Qinghai-Tibet high-speed railway, and build a solid national security protection line. With transport corridors providing a guarantee, it is necessary to build the Qinghai-Tibet high-speed railway in stages; enhance the Sichuan-Tibet railway line and stations, increase supporting transport facilities, promote the construction of the Lhasa metropolitan area, improve multi-dimensional comprehensive transportation lines on the Tibetan Plateau, and integrate them into the new western land-sea corridor. It is necessary to improve the coverage of airports and air routes in the region, improve the accessibility of border towns, build comprehensive transportation hub cities and towns on the plateau, strengthen national security strategic protection lines, and secure strategic transport routes and wartime emergency supply and support routes in Xinjiang and Tibet.
(2) Accelerate the introduction of “new infrastructure” to the Tibetan Plateau and build smart cities. Driven by scientific and technological innovation, it is necessary to accelerate the construction of new digital infrastructure; build national big data centers, supercomputing centers, strategic resource data backup centers, and big data trading centers; create Tibetan Plateau big data industrial parks; and vigorously develop the digital economy and smart cities. It is also necessary to promote the development of the “perceiving Qinghai and Tibet” campaign and promote practical applications of the Internet of Things in the fields of the ecological environment, emergency disaster relief, local agriculture and animal husbandry, and smart tourism.
(3) Adjust administrative divisions of plateau areas to strengthen the development of cities and towns in border areas. For the sake of national security, it is necessary to steadily optimize administrative divisions in border areas of the Tibetan Plateau by prioritizing development of the prefecture-level cities of Chayu, Golmud, and Ngari; making Linzhou County in Lhasa and Milin County in Nyingchi municipal districts; making the Dachaidan Administrative Council in Qinghai Province a city; making the Mozhugongka County and Tingri County in Tibet as well as Gonghe County, Maqin County, Haiyan County, Guide County, Nangqian County, Dulan County, and Menyuan Hui Autonomous County, Minhe Hui Autonomous County, and Huzhu Tu Nationality Autonomous County in Qinghai into cities; and establish new “gateways” to stabilize frontiers. Tingri County should be renamed Qomolangma City, and eligible townships should be made into towns and sub-districts.
(4) Accelerate the process of building a beautiful Qinghai and Tibet and beautiful cities to improve public satisfaction. It is necessary to firmly establish the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains, as well as an ice- and snow-covered landscape, are invaluable assets. It is also necessary to manage the relationship between ecological protection and enriching and benefiting the people; speed up the construction of a beautiful Qinghai and Tibet as well as beautiful towns and cities in the region in line with the goal of building a beautiful China; consolidate China’s vital ecological security barrier; and increase public satisfaction toward the building of a beautiful China and a beautiful Qinghai and Tibet.
(5) Accelerate reform of the land system in border cities and build a special zone for experimenting with border land reform. Based on adherence to the public ownership of land, as stipulated in the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, it is necessary to set up a special zone for land system reform in border cities (and towns), grant long-term stable land rights with sufficient rights and interests, and ensure the smooth transfer of land rights to border residents, enterprises, and units, so that they are responsible for and take steps toward guarding the land. Centered on border residents, it is necessary to set up special zones for experimenting with border land system reform and to implement special land policies based on conditions at borders (Liu et al., 2019; Zhang et al., 2019). Permanent land use rights and contracting rights should be granted to border residents who are responsible for guarding the land, so that defenders have their own land. Permanent income rights from land management should be granted to border residents, so that protectors of the land benefit from their efforts. Collectively owned construction land should be put to good use by transferring into the market to increase its value and efficiency in order to consolidate border areas. Major national strategies and territorial space planning should prioritize border cities as part of the focus on homeland security.

5 Discussion and conclusion

(1) The Tibetan Plateau, known as the “roof of the world,” is China’s national security shield and ecological security barrier. Whether to urbanize the region is a scientific proposition full of controversy in academia. This study affirmed that urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau is concentrated in linked poverty alleviation urbanization development regions and ethnic autonomous urbanization development regions, which are indispensable and important components of China’s new-type urbanization spatial pattern as well as the necessary path to achieving the basic modernization of the region in step with the rest of the country. Accelerating green urbanization and improving the quality of the region’s urbanization will play an irreplaceable role and make immeasurable distinctive contributions toward promoting the inclusion of urbanization of ethnic minority areas in the national new-type urbanization development pattern and choosing a green development path of urbanization with Chinese characteristics and the characteristics of the Tibetan Plateau; toward protecting the world’s last unspoiled region, exploring a way of building a beautiful Qinghai and Tibet, and ensuring long-term stability in ethnic minority border areas; and toward the further development of an urban system that strengthens border security in the region and optimizes the layout of the national urbanization strategy.
(2) Urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau shoulders the multiple special missions of safeguarding China’s national security shield and ecological security barrier as well as Asia’s water tower from instability and imbalance, transmitting traditional Chinese culture, and ensuring that the people who live in the Tibetan Plateau achieve modernization in step with the rest of China. These exceptional missions mean that the region’s urbanization has distinctive drivers that differ markedly from the rest of the country. It is a process that involves low-intensity development, cultural transmission, protection of land and borders, conservation of water resources, small concentrations and a wide dispersion of the population, social inclusivity, and improvements to the environment that benefit the people, which is driven by domestic investment, tourism, services, and paired assistance.
(3) Urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau must always be guided by the need to secure China’s territory and borders so as to safeguard national security by ensuring sufficient populations in border and rural areas and to comprehensively improve the quality of urbanization development. In terms of green development, it is necessary to improve the quality of ecological products and the capacity and level of ecological services, accentuate local features and folk customs, promote culture, and encourage people to tend livestock in rural areas and live in towns, thereby creating beautiful cities and towns in the Tibetan Plateau. In terms of low concentrations and a wide dispersion of the population, the overall urban pattern will be “three clusters, four belts, and multiple nodes.” The “three clusters” are the Xining, Lhasa, and Qaidam urban clusters; the “four belts” are along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, the Ancient Tang-Tibet Road, and border area urban belts; and “multiple nodes” refers to major urban nodes and border towns. In terms of ensuring connectivity, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway was completed ahead of schedule, national security lines are being strengthened, and “new infrastructure” and smart cities are being built in the Tibetan Plateau. In terms of homeland security, national strategies and territorial space planning should prioritize border cities.
(4) The harsh and fragile natural environment of the Tibetan Plateau limits the size of the permanent population and urban population that the region can sustain. Its small carrying capacity means that it is impossible to achieve large-scale urbanization, so there is no need to greatly increase the level of urbanization in the region. Moreover, urbanization in the Tibetan Plateau does not conform to stage-based principles. Rather, the speed and scale of urbanization development are based on the premises of protecting China’s territory and borders, guarding Asia’s water tower, transmitting culture, and green development. The purpose of improving the quality of urban development in the Tibetan Plateau is to improve the lives of the people who live there, enhance its role as an ecological security barrier, and strengthen the defense and security of China’s borders. It is necessary to clarify how many people the Tibetan Plateau can sustain and how many people can move to urban areas without having a negative impact on the region’s ecological environment. Although preliminary attempts have been made to explore this issue and preliminary conclusions have been drawn, it remains an important area of future research.

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my sincere thanks to Professor Yang Yongchun, Professor Zhang Haifeng, Professor Bao Chao, Dr. Wang Zhenbo, Dr. Ma Haitao, Dr. Li Guangdong, Dr. Qi Wei, Dr. Sun Siao, and Dr. Fan Yupeng for their valuable amendments and suggestions in the process of field research, discussion, writing and revision, as well as to Dr. Guo Xiaomin and Dr. Liao Xia for their assistance in collecting relevant materials and sorting documents.

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