Correlation Between Watershed Ecological Vulnerability And Ecosystem Services

Bailongjiang Watershed,a typical transitional ecotone,stretches from Tibetan Plateau to the Loess Plateau.Due to its special geographical conditions and human activities,human-land conflict is becoming increasingly sharp recently.At the same time,the unreasonable human activities and the growing resource development has endangered the ecological environment and socio-economic sustainable development seriously.Therefore,it is very vital to accurately assess and analyze the spatial-temporal distribution pattern of the ecological vulnerability and ecosystem services to understand their evolution.The exploring of the correlation between ecological vulnerability and ecosystem services is useful for the ecological restoration and reconstruction,especially for the disaster-prone watershed.Based on SRP model,Analytic Hierarchy Process and InVEST model,the paper quantify and visualize ecological vulnerability and ecosystem services respectively and correlation between watershed ecological vulnerability and ecosystem services,then put forward suggestions for ecosystem governance for the adaption to the local ecological vulnerability and ecosystem services.The main conclusions are as listed as below:(1)The ecological vulnerability in Bailongjiang Watershed can be divided into five levels: slight vulnerability,light vulnerability,moderate vulnerability,severe vulnerability,extreme vulnerability.From 1990 to 2014,the proportion of medium vulnerability regions is relatively large.The extreme and severe vulnerability regions are concentrated in the both sides of Baishui jiang,Bailongjiang and the tributary of Datuanyu River.The moderate vulnerability regions are distributed in the middle and northern part of Tanchang County,the southern part of Zhouqu County and the northern part of Baishuijiang and the southern Wudu District.The slight and light vulnerability areas are mainly distributed in the northwest of Bailnogjiang Watershed and Baishui jiang National Nature Reserve Area et al.(2)As to the ecosystem services,Wudu District has the largest crop production capacity,followed by Tanchang County,Wen County,Zhouqu County,Diebu County has the smallest value.According to the spatial distribution pattern of ecosystem services,the spatial distribution of water production and carbon storage in Bailongjiang Watershed is similar of which the high-value areas are both mainly concentrated in the southern parts of Tanchang County and the southern bank area of Baishuijiang;the low-value areas are mainly distributed in the urban areas and crop farming areas with larger population.The area distribution of soil conservation and high habitat quality is also similar.Namely,the high-value areas are mainly distributed in agro-forestry and nature reserves areas.The low-value areas are mainly located in the valleys of the Bailongjiang watershed in the Zhouqu-Wudu area with higher human activity and high calamity.(3)The correlation between ecological vulnerability and typical/integrated ecosystem services in Bailongjiang Watershed are as follows: The integrated regional ecosystem services are carried out by the weighted analysis of typical ecosystem services through three scenarios,which including ecosystem services equilibrium,crop production priority and ecological protection priority,respectively.In addition to being positively related to crop production,there is a significant negative correlation between ecological vulnerability and carbon storage,water production,soil conservation service and habitat quality.At same time,the integrated ecosystem services are assigned to three scenarios by valuation in this paper,the correlation between ecological vulnerability and integrated ecosystem services under ecosystem services equilibrium scenario and ecological protection priority scenario are negative correction;Under crop production priority scenario,the above two correlation is positive.(4)Based on the correlation analysis result of integrated ecosystem services and ecological vulnerability,the overlay analysis of the ecosystem service and ecological vulnerability of the scenario of the ecological protection priority resulted of four categories with consideration of the natural and human factors in Bailongjiang Watershed :(1)Comprehensive Development Zone,(2)Key Forestry Protected Zone,(3)Intensive Agricultural Production Zone,and(4)Ecological Protection and Recovery Zone.Some countermeasures and suggestions were put forward for the sustainable development and watershed ecosystem governance.