Dynamic analysis of ecological environment combined with land cover and NDVI changes and implications for sustainable urban-rural development: The case of Mu Us Sandy Land, China

Climate change and human activities have affected ecological environment in recent decades. This paper investigates the ecological environment change of the Mu Us sandy land based on a combined analysis of land cover and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) change trends. The results show that land cover changed moderately during 1990-2010, and areas experienced conversion accounted for 10% of the total land surface. The NDVI values show an evident increase at about 0.0076 year−1 during 2000-2014. This rate is lower than that of Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia region (0.0117 year−1), but greatly exceeds those of the Three-North Shelter Forest and the upper reaches of the Yellow River. Four categories of grids have been identified for accurate ecological restoration through analyzing the ecological performance index mainly based on land cover and NDVI indicators. The ecological restoration projects laid important foundation for ecological reconstruction in the Mu Us, while the wetting trend has been major climatic factors in vegetation improvement since 2000 (R = 0.687, P ≤ 0.01). However, both field investigation and statistical data analysis indicate that the ecological restoration in the Mu Us are experiencing increasing challenges, due to the growing human activities and still fragile eco-environment. Therefore, this paper suggests that urban-rural development and coal exploitation in this region should give full consideration to the carrying capacity of water and land resources. Overall, the evolving 'science' of 'BIG DATA' on coupled human-environment system can help to reveal the dynamics of ecological environment, and contribute valuable information for decision making concerning natural resources management and urban-rural development.