Effects of the Establishment of Fangcheng Camellia National Nature Reserve on Regional Land Use Dynamics

Abstract

The establishment of nature reserves is an important measure to protect rare wild animals and plants and their habitats. This plays a positive role in alleviating the ill effects of change in land use and protecting ecological diversity. Since the establishment of the first nature reserve in China, there has been notable development in the construction and infrastructure industry. Owing to this development, understanding whether nature reserves can effectively achieve the purpose of protection has gradually become a hot topic. An in-depth understanding of the evolution of land use types in nature reserves and their adjacent areas can evaluate the effectiveness of the construction of nature reserves, provide decision support for land resource planning, and help maintaining the balance of the ecosystem and sustainable development. Understanding the spatio-temporal evolution pattern of land use is important to create and preserve ecological security in protected areas. In this research, we studied the land use dynamics in Guangxi Golden Camellia national nature reserve and its adjacent two-kilometer buffer zone. Land use information was extracted from seven Landsat TM/OLI images from 1986, 1994, 1999, 2004, 2009, 2014, and 2019. The spatio-temporal dynamics of land use over the past 35 years were studied using decision tree analysis and a transition matrix. The results showed that the land use in the reserve is mainly dominated by forestland, and the adjacent areas of the reserve is mainly dominated by forestland and arable land. Although the proportion of construction land is small, it has increased annually over the past 35 years. It was observed from the studies that the dynamic degree of construction land was always relatively high in the non-core region of the reserve and the adjacent areas, whereas the dynamic degrees of other land types fluctuated more gently, and the integrated land use dynamic degree of the adjacent areas was less. The core area changed more drastically, the change in the trend of the comprehensive land use dynamic degree in the adjacent areas and the non-core area was similar. After the establishment of the reserve, human disturbance was reduced in this region, and the land-use pattern became more stable. Furthermore, the conversion of land use types in the adjacent areas was frequent, of which the transfer and exchange between cultivated land and forest land was the most drastic, the conversion of land use in the non-core region was less. This shows that the establishment and management of the reserve effectively protects the local ecological environment. Additionally, the studies showed that the migration of the land use center of gravity had a certain direction. The center of gravity of all land use types in the non-core area of the reserve generally migrated to the northeast, and the center of gravity of construction land and cultivated land in the adjacent area of the reserve generally migrated to the west, indicating that the expansion of the original construction land had a strong influence on land use dynamics. The management of the reserve has achieved relatively remarkable effects and the ecological environment inside the reserve has been improved, but the slow increase of land for internal construction and resources exploitation still have a negative impact on the habitat quality of the reserve. This study provides data to support the dynamic monitoring of land use and further improvement of protection and restoration measures in subtropical natural reserves.

Keywords

• national nature reserves
• land use change
• non-core areas
• adjacent areas
• camellia nature reserve