PARENT SESSION
Contributed Oral Session 1: Landscape History
Monday, August 8, 8:00 AM - 11:30 AM, Meeting Room 513 A, Level 5, Palais des congrès de Montréal

Landscape change in the Upper Min River, southwestern China.

He, Xingyuan^*,1, Zhao, Yonghua^{1, 2}, Hu, Yuanman¹, ¹ Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang, China² Chang'an University, Xi’an

ABSTRACT- Based on the three techniques (GIS, RS, GPS), landscape change from 1974 to 2000 in the upper reaches of Min River in the southwestern China during the past 20 years was indicated in the paper. The results showed that the landscape in the study area fragmented year by year. At the regional scale, the area of forest land decreased and that of cropland, shrub land, economic forest, grassland, and built up land increased and that of river, lake, and unused land did not change. Grassland and shrubland notably increased in area, while forestland decreased significantly. The conversion of land use and land cover types mainly happened among forestland, shrubland, grassland, economic forest, cropland, and built up land. Forestland was the only decreasing landscape type. The landscape became more fragmented. Based on the statistic data using PCA (Principal Component Analysis) in SPSS software, the cause of landscape change was analyzed. The early deforestation policy, the great leap forward movement, and the second land reform and so on were responsible for the landscape change, and human activities played a more important role too. The human factor was the principal cause of landscape change in the upper reaches of Min River. The increasing population, economic development, irrational forest deforestation, and unreasonable stockbreeding resulted that the ecology environment was destroyed, the area of forest decreased, and soil and water conversation was bad. Even though the results were quantificational changes, which could provide basic data and promote local sustainable landscape management.

Key words: the upper Min River, Landscape change, China, PCA