Methodological framework for identifying sustainability intervention priority areas on coastal landscapes and its application in China

Wang Yafei; Fan Jie; Li Jiuyi; Zhou Bing-Bing; Wang Qiang

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.142603

Methodological framework for identifying sustainability intervention priority areas on coastal landscapes and its application in China

Sci Total Environ. 2021 Apr 20:766:142603. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.142603. Epub 2020 Oct 3.

Authors

Wang Yafei¹, Fan Jie², Li Jiuyi¹, Zhou Bing-Bing³, Wang Qiang⁴

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Regional Sustainable Development Modeling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
² Key Laboratory of Regional Sustainable Development Modeling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: fanj@igsnrr.ac.cn.
³ School of Sustainability, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287, USA. Electronic address: bingbing.zhou@asu.edu.
⁴ School of Geographical Sciences, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, Fujian 350007, China.

PMID: 33601669
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.142603

Abstract

In regional sustainability evaluation and policy analysis, the paradigm of safe operating spaces (SOS) has been widely applied. Yet, SOS is not readily useful for informing policy interventions toward sustainability transition. This study reports on a methodological framework that operationalizes SOS at the regional scale for designing spatially targeted sustainability interventions. In particular, this framework accounts for teleology by integrating policy orientations of the place-variant "major function" of development, and provides early-warnings by integrating long-term social-environmental trends. The framework we proposed has been applied by the Chinese government in a coastal province (Liaoning) for a landscape sustainability project, which is introduced here step-by-step. The four main steps include: (1) Quantifying SOS status across multiple "what to sustain" dimensions, e.g., land scarcity, water scarcity, pollutant discharge, and ecosystem health for the inland, and coastal exploitation intensity, marine environmental quality, and marine ecosystem biodiversity for the sea. (2) Quantifying SOS status in terms of the place-variant "what to develop" dimensions, e.g., urbanization-oriented, agriculture-stock-oriented, versus conservation-oriented development. (3) Integrating the two as a composite indicator of three ordinal levels to classify the current SOS status. (4) Developing a multi-level sustainability early-warning system by cross-analysis of the SOS status and social-environmental interaction trends (e.g., changes in, e.g., resource utilization efficiency, pollutant discharge, and eco-environmental quality). The potential use of the framework is demonstrated through the case of Liaoning Province, China, which helps policy-makers to identify priority areas for sustainability interventions. Methodological robustness and future directions of applying this multi-level sustainability early-warning system are further discussed.

Keywords: Coastal region; Landscape sustainability; Safe operating space; Social-environmental systems; Sustainability early-warnings.