Context
Agricultural land abandonment across the steppe belt of Eurasia has provided an opportunity for the restoration of steppe landscapes in recent decades. However, global food demands are about to revert this trajectory and put restored steppe landscapes at risk.
Objectives
We analysed steppe development in southern Russia in the last 40 years, assessed its spatial patterns and drivers of change for several periods.
Methods
Using Landsat imagery, we mapped the permanent steppe and steppe restoration from 1990 to 2018. Based on regression tree models, we evaluate and explain its dynamics. Results were compared with district-level trends in land-use intensities of cropland.
Results
We found 70% of the steppe in 2018 represented permanent steppe and 30% of former cropland dominantly abandoned in the postsocialism (1990–2000). The permanent steppe and steppe restored in the postsocialism (1990–2000) were located far from settlements, on rough terrain and in districts of the Virgin Land Campaign (1954–1963). In recent decades, the patterns of steppe restoration (2000–2018) were mostly determined by unfavourable agroclimatic conditions and distance from grain storage facilities. The restoration pattern reflects regional differences in land-use intensities, e.g., isolated steppe patches mostly appeared in areas of intensive agricultural land-use.
Conclusions
Steppe restoration has appeared in areas marginal for agricultural production, with poor natural conditions and little human footprint. Consequently, the permanent steppe became less fragmented and a more continuous steppe landscape resulted. The remaining isolated steppe patches require attention in restoration programs as they are mostly located in areas of intensive agricultural land-use.
We study the factors and tendencies for a technogenic disturbance of Volga-Ural steppe region landscapes exposed to the influence of oil-and-gas production. The study area is 1500km2, including landscapes of more than 25 oil-and-gas fields with a various time of development and different alternatives and scales of technogenic impact. Survey of landscapes is as a part of the regional geo-ecological analysis, which incorporates the analysis of a group of natural factors that specify the attributes of the steppe zone, and classification and identification of the most large-scale and widespread environmental problems. We present the recommended algorithm for making a regional geo-ecological analysis which incorporates the ways, methods, and approaches to achieving ecological-subsoil-user balance in oil-and-gas production areas We show that such environmental problems as haphazard expansion of disturbed lands, fragmentation of landscapes, change in conditions of water reservoirs, intensification of exogenic processes, creation of temperature anomaly areas, reduction of the number of mammals are most likely to occur within oil-and-gas fields. So-called Technogenic geosystems of oil-and-gas fields form in the landscapes. Knowledge about the specific aspects and regularities in the functioning of these geosystems should be used to create prognostic scenarios of disturbed lands development and target-focused optimisation measures.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.