Quantifying trade‐offs of land multifunctionality evaluated by set pair analysis in ecologically vulnerable areas of northwestern China

Abstract

Land systems in drylands have been experiencing increasing conflicts among multiple land functions. The improvement of one function is often at the cost of other functions, and trade-offs occur. Previous studies often cannot adequately address the fuzziness and lack an optimal benchmark when assessing land multifunctionality, and neglect the nonlinear features when quantifying the trade-offs. Taking the Heihe River Basin (HRB) in China as a study area, we applied the set pair analysis (SPA) to develop a novel framework for assessing land multifunctionality at a grid scale from the production-living ecological aspects. We then utilized the constraint line fitted with segmented quantile regression to identify the trade-offs among land functions.The results showed that our developed model could effectively measure land multifunctionality. The overall land multifunctionality in the HRB increased between 2000-2015, and the increased production and living functions made more contributions. From 2000 to 2015, the relationship between production function and ecological function changed from the status of synergy to trade-off, and the degree first increased and then decreased. The coupling coordination degree index showed that the coordination among land functions was high in the south and low in the north, which was mainly controlled by ecological functions. The effects of natural and anthropogenic drivers on land functions showed nonlinear characteristics, and thresholds existed for some factors showing the abrupt change in influence. We concluded that our research provides reliable and detailed information about the interactions among land functions, which is essential for sustainable land use and territorial spatial planning.

Evaluation Model and Application of the Implementation Effectiveness of the River Chief System (RCS)—Taking Henan Province as an Example

“…Therefore, set pair analysis has become an effective method among the various approaches for solving problems related to multi-objective decision-making and multi-attribute evaluation in uncertain systems. In recent years, set pair theory has been successfully applied to various fields, including evaluation [46], management [47], decision-making [48], forecasting [49], planning [50], and artificial intelligence [51].…”

Spatial Characteristics of Land Use Multifunctionality and Their Trade-Off/Synergy in Urumqi, China: Implication for Land Space Zoning Management

“…The complex interrelationships between regional natural ecosystem systems and artificial ecosystems have led to a trade-off/synergy between LUMF [53]. Geopolitical factors such as geographical advantages and the natural environment can promote changes in land use functions, while objective factors such as national policies and regional planning can influence the direction and size of functional changes [54]. The mechanical balance model can reflect the trade-off/synergy type between primary functions, but it cannot characterize the trade-off/synergy relationship between secondary functions.…”

Evolution and Coordination of Cultivated Land Multifunctionality in Poyang Lake Ecological Economic Zone

“…Regarding research methods, Spearman's rank correlation [26,27], index pulsing [28], coupled coordination degree [29,30], and full permutation polygon synthetic indicator [31,32] methods have mainly been used. Studies have focused on cultivated land multifunctionality's regional differences [6,33], spatial evolution [34], astringency [35,36], driving factors [29,37], conflict [18,38], and collaboration recognition [39,40]. However, the coordination problems between sub-functions have rarely been studied.…”