Interaction of ecological and social factors affects vegetation recovery in China

Global environmental problems have significant natural and socioeconomic consequences. However, the consequences are often evaluated independently by ecologists and social scientists. In an effort to integrate the consequences of the two types of problem during ecological restoration and thereby improve future development of environmental policy, we used regression analysis and remote sensing to calculate the relative contributions of human activities, climate change, and socioeconomic development to land use and cover change during China’s huge investments in ecological restoration since the 1980s. We performed this analysis both for China as a whole, and for eight regions with distinctive ecological and social characteristics. We found that China’s fast socioeconomic development and decreasing rural population were dominant factors in ecological restoration, whereas direct human intervention was a paradoxical factor that did not always lead to recovery. However, the changes in vegetation cover and the dominant causal factors differed among the regions of China as a result of differences in local conditions. Because of the complexity of ecosystem restoration, a region-specific strategy based on integrating ecological and socioeconomic factors should be developed. In particular, we urge caution when considering single, monolithic approaches (such as the afforestation that is currently the main approach) because these approaches ignore the local limits imposed by ecological factors such as climate and soils and human factors such as socioeconomic characteristics; such approaches can be dangerous if they neglect key social or natural factors.