Spatiotemporal change of ecologic environment quality and human interaction factors in three gorges ecologic economic corridor, based on RSEI

Abstract

The Three Gorges Ecologic Economic (Eco-Economic) Corridor is an ecological barrier in the Yangtze River's upstream and midstream areas. Due to anthropogenic activities, the corridor's ecologic environment quality has waned over the last few years. To achieve economic sustainability in this region, the premise is to assess the quality of the ecological environment in the corridor, which comprises the main counties, and to identify its response to human activities. As a result, this article developed the Remote Sensing Ecologic Index (RSEI) using MODIS data in the Three Gorges Eco-Economic Corridor from 2001 to 2019 to examine its ecological environment. Then human interaction factors affecting ecologic environment quality were probed using a Geographical Detector (geo-detector). The results showed that: (1) From 2001 to 2019, the average RSEI index of the Three Gorges Eco-Economic Corridor ranged between 0.474 and 0.655. The areas with ecological environment quality significantly worse and worse grades gathered in eastern and western regions, which is located alongside the Yangtze River and gradually radiated to surrounding areas. (2) The average ecologic environment quality level in the Three Gorges Eco-Economic Corridor was 78.19%, stable at about 75% −80% in most cases and medium and good area accounts for the main part. (3) Compared with the contribution of a single factor, multi-factor interaction had another noticeable effect on ecologic environment quality. Moreover, the top 10 multi-factor interactions were mainly between GDPs per capita and agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, and fishery. Our research findings can be used to the realization of green economic growth in the Three Gorges Eco-Economic Corridor.

Keywords

• Ecologic environment quality
• Remote sensing ecologic index
• Multi-factor interaction
• Geo-detector