Assessing previous land-vegetation productivity relationships on mountainous areas hosting coming Winter Olympics Games in 2022

Hengshuo Zhang; Yang Yu; Tonggang Zha; Jesús Rodrigo-Comino

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.147870

Assessing previous land-vegetation productivity relationships on mountainous areas hosting coming Winter Olympics Games in 2022

Sci Total Environ. 2021 Sep 20:788:147870. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.147870. Epub 2021 May 21.

Authors

Hengshuo Zhang¹, Yang Yu², Tonggang Zha³, Jesús Rodrigo-Comino⁴

Affiliations

¹ School of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Qinghua East Road 35, Beijing 100083, China; Jixian National Forest Ecosystem Research Network Station, CNERN, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China.
² School of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Qinghua East Road 35, Beijing 100083, China; Jixian National Forest Ecosystem Research Network Station, CNERN, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China. Electronic address: theodoreyy@gmail.com.
³ School of Soil and Water Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Qinghua East Road 35, Beijing 100083, China; Jixian National Forest Ecosystem Research Network Station, CNERN, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China. Electronic address: zhtg73@bjfu.edu.cn.
⁴ Department of Physical Geography, University of Trier, 54296 Trier, Germany; Soil Erosion and Degradation Research Group, Department of Geography, Valencia University, Blasco Ibàñez, 28, 46010 Valencia, Spain.

PMID: 34134366
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.147870

Abstract

In order to prevent land degradation in areas before hosting big events such as the Winter Olympic Games (WOG), developing strategic vegetation restoration plans is key. To evaluate four experimental areas with different degrees of human impacts located in the Chongli District, northern Hebei Province, China, where the coming WOG 2022 will take considering: i) the feedback mechanisms between vegetation and soil in the process of future vegetation restoration; ii) the vegetation productivity of land in different land-use types; iii) the management mode considering the sustainable development as the primary goal. To achieve these goals, we applied a minimum soil data set (MDS) to screen the most relevant indicators (soil organic matter (SOM), total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), available phosphorus (AP), available potassium (AK), available nitrogen (AN), soil bulk density (BD), soil porosity (SP), pH, clay, silt, sand and gravel), and the nonlinear scoring method to establish a soil quality index (SQI). For this purpose, 400 soil samples (0-20 cm depth), the total biomass of one natural grassland (NG) and abandoned farmland (AF), and the growing stock of natural secondary forest (NF) and a larch plantation (LP). The results showed that the SQI can be established based on TN, silt, TP and gravel. Under LP and AF land-use type, vegetation showing a poor effect on the improvement of soil quality (SQIs were significantly lower than the NF and NG). It was also observed that above 1700 m, the growing stock of artificial vegetation exceeds the range of vegetation productivity (about 165 m³·h^-1) that the land can carry under the LP. We concluded that the main reason is the excessive depletion of N and P after human impacts. On the other hand, the SQI of NF and NG were higher, which is due to the significant improvement of soil quality by the conservation of the vegetation, so that no longer limited by the spatial distribution law, also showing higher vegetation productivity of land at different altitudes. This demonstrates that it is key to develop effective restoration plans considering the soil-vegetation relationship status of the NF and NG land-use types in this area in the territories used by the activities of the WOG 2022.

Keywords: Big sport winter events; Land management; Mountain land; Soil quality; Vegetation status.