Quantifying the Compound Factors of Forest Land Changes in the Pearl River Delta, China

Abstract

Forestland has been a focus of urbanization research, yet the effect of urbanization on forest land change on an urban agglomeration scale still remains unclear. Screening and quantifying the main factors affecting forest land changes have practical significance for land planning and management. Considering the characteristics of the region and referring to related studies, 26 natural, social, and economic factors were screened in the Pearl River Delta (PRD), where land-use changes are intense. Geographically weighted regression and the relative importance were used to quantify the spatial heterogeneity of these main factors. There was still a large area of deforestation evident in the PRD with its afforestation area of 604.3 km2 (mainly converted from cropland) and a deforestation area of 1544.6 km2 (mainly converted from built-up land). The effects of socio-economic factors were the main factors for these forest land changes, especially the rural population and migration. Deforestation mainly occurs in urban growth boundaries, which will be the focus area for further land management. These main factors have the potential to provide a methodological contribution to land-use changes, and the results of this study can provide a solid theoretical basis for forest land management and urban planning (e.g., balancing expansion of built-up land and ecological protection that advances forest land protection and restoration).

Electronics, Close-Range Sensors and Artificial Intelligence in Forestry

“…Urbanization causes forest loss by generating high demand for residential facilities and infrastructure facilities in neighboring areas, especially in the development area, as the population and the number of households increase beyond simple regional development [108,109]. This is consistent with the results of Chen et al that forest loss occurred due to urban development including the increase of roads and residential areas [110]. Urbanization and development are likely to continue in the future, so it is necessary to prepare measures to maintain the balance of forest conservation and forest loss between urbanization and regional development.…”

Integrating Ecological Assessments to Target Priority Restoration Areas: A Case Study in the Pearl River Delta Urban Agglomeration, China

“…Landsat 8 remote sensing images were used as data sources to interpret ecological space data obtained in 2018. Through random sampling inspections, the accuracy rates of land-use classifications were greater than 94% (Table S1), which can be used to explain the land changes [10,27].…”

“…This study used both questionnaire and field surveys to construct an evaluation framework by developing ecological quality and ecological health indices with which decision-makers, stakeholders, the public, experts, and policy goals are concerned. We used the Pearl River Delta (PRD) urban agglomeration as a case study, which is one of the most developed, densely populated, and highly urbanized areas in China [27]. Our goals were to: (1) Construct a framework to identify priority ecological restoration areas based upon the combination of ecological quality and health; (2) perform a cluster analysis of the restoration areas' ecological indices and identify ecological restoration bundles, and (3) explore the characteristics of ecological restoration bundles and offer suggestions for ecological management.…”

Causes of Changing Woodland Landscape Patterns in Southern China

“…The Gannan area of Jiangxi Province is an ecological geographical barrier in southern China. The forest ecosystem in the area is influenced by geographical and human factors simultaneously so that a single landscape index may not adequately reflect changes in forest landscape [27]. Consequently, there is an urgent need for a variety of methods to analyze forest landscape trends.…”