Do Ecosystem Service Value Increase and Environmental Quality Improve due to Large–Scale Ecological Water Conveyance in an Arid Region of China?

Abstract

With the rapid development of the economy and the intensification of human activities, ecological systems have been degraded, especially in arid areas. The lower reaches of the Tarim River represent a typical arid area in China. Since 2000, the Chinese government has been heavily investing in the protection and restoration of the natural ecological environment of the lower reaches of the Tarim River. In this study, we aimed to resolve two key scientific issues: (1) reveal the changing characteristics of land-use in the region and identify the changes in ecosystem service value caused by these land-use changes and (2) evaluate whether the environmental quality has improved or worsened. The objective of this study is to verify whether the ecological water conveyance project promotes an increase in the ecosystem service value, with an improvement in the ecological environment, to thereby provide references for the evaluated effects of ecological water conveyance for the management of water resources. In this way, economic development can support environmental protection. Thus, the economy can be sustainably developed. Hence, based on the remote sensing data of land-use in 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2016, with the value coefficients proposed by Constanza in 1997 and changing characteristics in the land-use, the ecological service value, and environmental conditions from 1990 to 2016 were analysed. According to our results, from 1990 to 2016, the ecosystem service value has increased substantially, indicating that the benefits of ecological water conveyance were significant. The environmental condition index increased by 21.14%, showing that the ecological environment has improved. However, the environmental quality remained low. In the future, we should formulate plans for reasonable land-use that control the replacement of woodlands and grasslands with farmlands and construction. The results of this study provide a scientific basis and practical guide for restoring inland river ecosystems in arid regions.

Assessment of Ecosystem Service Value and Its Differences in the Yellow River Basin and Yangtze River Basin

“…Moreover, researchers tend to adopt different methods in their research, but no method is immune from disadvantages [3]. For example, in the equivalent value method, the variation in the standard equivalence factor in spatial and temporal scales is not considered in most studies or roughly rectified with various methods [3,25,26]. The energy value conversion rate adopted in different studies is very different when using the energy value conversion method [27], making it not useful for comparing the evaluation results from different studies.…”

Ecological Compensation and Green Development Institutional Reform in the Yangtze River Economic Belt

“…Ecosystem services present a high degree of spatial heterogeneity and dynamism. The international experiences of ecological services focus on water resources, water conservation, and disaster mitigation based on integrated river basin management, land and water resources use, and economic policy design [16,17] to analyze relationships between economic development and ecological services, upstream protection and downstream development, agricultural development, and land-use scenarios with associated impacts on ecosystems [18][19][20][21].…”