Study Of The Biocapacity In Ruijin City With The Ecological Footprint

Ecological footprint, which is a new biophysical method of ecological assessment, is developing rapidly. It quantifies the ecological sustainability of the development of a nation or an area from the standpoint of biological production. Ecological footprint analysis is superior to other biophysical methods of ecological sustainability assessment in three respects: firstly, the indices used have specific meanings; secondly, the model is easy to comprehend and readily applied to different contexts; and thirdly, the data required are widely obtainable, allowing global comparisons.However,with the rapid economic development in our society ,more and more environment problems have been raised and great damages have been caused to our eco-system,which pose terrific dangers to our social sustainable development and ,to top of it,risk our humanbeings on the brink of life-and-death.As a result,it is vital to assessment and evaluate the quality of scoical development and the present conditions of our eco-system.Owing to the ecological footprint model introduced by Wackernagel Mathis and William E. Rees,it helps us qualify the biocapacity of regional eco-system and the situation of our development.Therefore,the model is readily applied to study the regional biocapacity in the relative long temporal period and to assessmentlevel of the sustainability of regional development.Although great economic achievements have been made by RuiJin City in recent decades,the huge impact has been posed on its environment and eco-system.Based on the guide of the sustainable principle and the model of eco-footprint ,the research has explored the sustainability of the economic development in RuiJin City by accouting the footprints from 2000 to 2006 in order to provide the necessary reference for the management of local authority.The major results showed by the study as follow:(1)The annual total ecological demand and the personal eco-footprint both have a rising trend in Ruijin city,2000-2006.the former annual increasing percentage is 8.76%,the latter is 7.72%. (2)The personal eco-capacity ,in whole,presents a decreasing trend ,in Ruijin city,2000-2006.it drops by 0.95% annually from 2001 to 2006.the total eco-capacity in all has no apparent changes of either up or down in this period(3)The sustainability in Ruijin city features by eco-reserve before 2003 and eco-deficit from 2003 to 2006.it annual increasing percentage is 174% up from 0.0143gha in 2003 to 0.3964gha in 2006.(4)The the EF demand by GDP of 10,000 RMB in Ruijin city shows a decreasing trend,2000-2006.annually down by 4.06%.the utility efficency of resource in Ruijin city has been improved by 27% in this six years.(5)The fast-growing population in Ruijin city takes the major account for its dramatically-increasing eco-deficit.its annual natural population increasing ratio is 9.64‰from 586368 in 2000 to 621127 in 2006.Besides,the study gives some suggestions and strategies in order to boost the eco-capacity of Ruijin city and strengthen its sustainability.