Land use/cover and land degradation across the Eurasian steppe: Dynamics, patterns and driving factors

Zhenrong Du; Le Yu; Xin Chen; Bingbo Gao; Jianyu Yang; Haohuan Fu; Peng Gong

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.168593

Land use/cover and land degradation across the Eurasian steppe: Dynamics, patterns and driving factors

Sci Total Environ. 2024 Jan 20:909:168593. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.168593. Epub 2023 Nov 14.

Authors

Zhenrong Du¹, Le Yu², Xin Chen³, Bingbo Gao⁴, Jianyu Yang⁴, Haohuan Fu⁵, Peng Gong⁶

Affiliations

¹ Department of Earth System Science, Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Institute for Global Change Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; School of Information and Communication Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China.
² Department of Earth System Science, Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Institute for Global Change Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; Ministry of Education Ecological Field Station for East Asian Migratory Birds, Beijing 100084, China; Tsinghua University (Department of Earth System Science)- Xi'an Institute of Surveying and Mapping Joint Research Center for Next-Generation Smart Mapping, Beijing 100084, China. Electronic address: leyu@tsinghua.edu.cn.
³ Institute of Loess Plateau, Shanxi University, Taiyuan 030006, China.
⁴ College of Land Science and Technology, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100193, China.
⁵ Department of Earth System Science, Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Institute for Global Change Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; Tsinghua University (Department of Earth System Science)- Xi'an Institute of Surveying and Mapping Joint Research Center for Next-Generation Smart Mapping, Beijing 100084, China.
⁶ Ministry of Education Ecological Field Station for East Asian Migratory Birds, Beijing 100084, China; Department of Geography, Department of Earth Sciences, and Institute for Climate and Carbon Neutrality, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077, China.

PMID: 37972781
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.168593

Abstract

Despite the ecological and socio-economic importance of Eurasian steppe, the land use/cover change, land degradation and the threats facing this precious ecosystem still have not been comprehensively understood. Taking advantages of the land use/cover change monitoring platform (FROM-GLC Plus), this study developed the annual land use/cover maps during 2000-2022, and the land use/cover change, especially the change of grassland, was further analyzed. The grassland area exhibited a net increase, predominantly transformed from cropland, forest, and bareland, accounting for 17.64 %, 31.91 %, and 45.60 %, respectively. To monitor land degradation, we adopted the framework suggested by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). According to the monitoring result, grassland constituted the highest proportion of degraded land (39.82 %). This may due to its dominance in the Eurasian steppe's land use/cover, as the extent of grassland degradation (1.92 %) was lower than the overall land degradation level (2.83 %) across the region. To offer tailored and sustainable development recommendations, we quantified the driving factors behind land dynamics using the geographical detector model and convergent cross mapping (CCM), considering both spatial and temporal dimensions. Environmental and socio-economic factors, such as precipitation, temperature, urbanization, mining and grazing intensity, etc., were integrated into the analysis. We found that urbanization, cropland and moisture distribution emerged as key drivers influencing land degradation's spatial distribution in the Eurasian steppe, while temperature variations between years impacted vegetation changes. This research thus provides a deeper understanding of the region's land dynamics, enhancing comprehensive monitoring of the Eurasian steppe's land dynamics. Moreover, it serves as a foundation for policymakers and land managers to devise conservation strategies and sustainable development initiatives for this critical ecosystem.

Keywords: Convergent cross mapping (CCM); Geographical detector model; Grassland; Land degradation; Land use/cover change.