Research On Ecological Footprint Of Forest Resources In Gansu Provincwe

Resources are the basis for survival and development of human and a necessary condition for development of human society, which have a close relationship with environment and humanity. Forest resources are an important part of natural resources, thus protection and development of forest resources for sustainable utilization are of significance for improving ecological environment, developing economy and raising people's living standards.As a quantitative analytical method for measuring sustainable development, ecological footprint has been widely applied in many kinds of research fields for its characteristics of simple operation and easy to be understood. In this paper, based on reviewing on research progress of ecological footprint, an ecological footprint model suitable for evaluating forest resources was developed to to calculate the per capita ecological footprint and ecological carrying capacity of forest resources as well as the per capita ecological footprint deficit level of forest resources in Gansu Province from 2003 to 2008, and to analysis the per capita ecological footprint index changes of forest resources in Gansu Province from 2003 to 2008. At the same time, by means of the gray relational analysis method, factors impacting ecological footprint index decline of forest resources in Gansu Province were analyzed. The main results are as follows:1. Three major consumption accounts, account of biological resources, fossil energy account and forest tourism account have been established based on the traditional ecological footprint method according to the subject investigated and three benefits of forest. The account of biological resources includes forest products and by-products; the fossil energy account covers the main kinds of fossil energy of the study area during the time; the forest tourism account consists of accommodation and tours according to the directly consumption to forest resources.2. There will be misleading if the value of global harmonization is chosen as the production factors at provincial level. In order to get close to the actual ecological footprint, the forest land production factors in Gansu Province from 2003 to 2008 have been calculated at average national productivity level as follows:0.29,0.24,0.22,0.21,0.21,0.20. 3. Reasons leading to changing for per capita ecological deficit of forest resources in Gansu Province are:(1) There was a little change in the population of Gansu Province from 2003 to 2008 and the average annual growth rate of population was 0.19%. The per capita ecological footprint deficit for forest resources ascended from -163.68m2/cap in 2003 to 582.41m2/cap in 2008 because of the growth at consumption levels of forest resources leading to the demand increasing of ecological footprint.(2) The forest productivity in Gansu Province was declining, resulting in lower total ecological carrying capacity of forest resources, which promoted the per capita ecological footprint for forest resources and increased the deficit level.4. The primary factor responsible for the per capita ecological footprint index decline of forest resources in Gansu Province is the increasing level of per capita consumption of coal and natural gas year by year, resulting in the ascension of carbon dioxide emissions, which aggravated the ecological footprint of forest land used for absorbing carbon dioxide. Secondly, both the increase of the numbers in forest tourism and beds in forest parks and the raise of per capita consumption in wood and traditional Chinese medicines led to the aggravation of ecological footprint to forest land, causing per capita ecological footprint index for forest resources to drop from 14.48% in 2003 to -74.67% in 2008.