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Industrial wastewater discharge in China is increasing with the country's economic development and it is worthy of concern. The discharge is primarily relevant to the direct discharge coefficient of each sector of the economy, its direct input coefficient and the final demand in input-output models. In this study, we calculated the sensitivity of the reduction in the Chinese industrial wastewater discharge using the direct input coefficients based on the theory of error-transmission in an input-output framework. Using input-output models, we calculated the direct and total industrial wastewater discharge coefficients. Analysis of 2007 input-output data of 30 sectors of the Chinese economy and of 30 provincial regions of China indicates that by lowering their direct input coefficients, the manufacturers of textiles, paper and paper products, chemical products, smelting and metal pressing, telecommunication equipment, computers and other electronic equipment will significantly reduce their amounts of industrial wastewater discharge. By lowering intra-provincial direct input coefficients to industrial sectors themselves of Jiangsu, Shandong and Zhejiang, there will be a significant reduction in industrial wastewater discharge for the country as a whole. Investment in production technology and improvement in organizational efficiency in these sectors and in these provinces can help lessen the direct input coefficients, thereby effectively achieving a reduction in industrial wastewater discharge in China via industrial restructuring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientific collaboration has become an important part of the people-to-people exchanges in the Belt and Road initiative, and remarkable progress has been made since 2013. Taking the 65 countries along the Belt and Road (BRI countries) as the research areas and using collaborated Web of Science (WOS) core collection papers to construct an international scientific collaboration matrix, the paper explores the spatial structure, hierarchy and formation mechanisms of scientific collaboration networks of 65 countries along the Belt and Road. The results show that: 1) Beyond the Belt and Road regions (BRI regions), Central & Eastern Europe, China and West Asia & North Africa have formed a situation in which they all have the most external links with other countries beyond BRI regions. China has the dominant role over other BRI countries in generating scientific links. The overall spatial structure has changed to a skeleton structure consisting of many dense regions, such as Europe, North America, East Asia and Oceania. 2) Within the Belt and Road regions, Central & Eastern Europe has become the largest collaboration partner with other sub-regions in BRI countries. The spatial structure of scientific collaboration networks has transformed from the 'dual core' composed of China and the Central & Eastern Europe region, to the 'multi-polarization' composed of 'one zone and multi-points'. 3) The hierarchical structure of scientific collaboration networks presents a typical 'core-periphery' structure, and changes from 'single core' to 'double cores'. 4) Among the formation mechanisms of scientific collaboration networks, scientific research strength and social proximity play the most important roles, while geographical distance gradually weakens the hindrance to scientific collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agro-pastoral ecotone of northern China is the prominent area for agricultural production, but it is also the most typical ecological fragile area with frequent drought disasters. Taking Yulin City at Shaanxi Province in China as the case area, the paper aims to investigate the spatio-temporal changes of agricultural vulnerability to drought in China's agro-pastoral ecotone in the period 2000 to 2020. The results show that: 1) the agricultural vulnerability to drought in Yulin City has shifted from high vulnerability in the period 2000–2010 to low vulnerability in the period 2011–2020. 2) There exist obvious spatio-temporal differences of the agricultural vulnerability to drought in Yulin City during the research period. 3) Four sensitive events and 14 resilient events were identified in the research and the crops of Yulin had become more resilient to drought. Finally, the paper put forward with policy implications to make adaptive strategies of agriculture to climate change in China's agro-pastoral ecotone in the future, e.g., carrying out agricultural zoning based on agricultural production conditions, intensifying the construction of disaster prevention and relief system, and integrating with modern agricultural technology to develop new type agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to the debate on the nexus between informal economies and the environment by investigating the long-term dynamic impacts of China's informal economies on pollution and considering regional differences in informal economies' pollution. This paper uses the Multiple Indicators Multiple Causes (MIMIC) model to estimate the size of informal economies and employs econometric models to examine their relationships to pollution based on provincial-level panel data from 2000 to 2017. The results indicate that informal economies' effects on environmental pollution are not purely positive or negative. Rather, our model indicates that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between informal economies and pollution in the long run in China; this means that the level of environmental pollution increases at first and then decreases with the growth of informal economies. Further analysis shows that while this inverted, U-shaped relationship is significant in different regions of China, it is affected by different environmental impact factors. The paper concludes by discussing the policy implications for environmental protection and sustainable development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local climate zones (LCZs) are an effective nexus linking internal urban structures to the local climate and have been widely used to study urban thermal environment. However, few studies considered how much the temperature changed due to LCZs transformation and their synergy. This paper quantified the change of urban land surface temperature (LST) in LCZs transformation process by combining the land use transfer matrix with zonal statistics method during 2000–2019 in the Xi'an metropolitan. The results show that, firstly, both LCZs and LST had significant spatiotemporal variations and synchrony. The period when the most LCZs were converted was also the LST rose the fastest, and the spatial growth of the LST coincided with the spatial expansion of the built type LCZs. Secondly, the LST difference between land cover type LCZs and built type LCZs gradually widened. And LST rose more in both built type LCZs transferred in and out. Finally, the Xi'an-Xianyang profile showed that the maximum temperature difference between the peaks and valleys of the LST increased by 4.39°C, indicating that localized high temperature phenomena and fluctuations in the urban thermal environment became more pronounced from 2000 to 2019. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural green development is an essential direction for global sustainable agriculture. The academic literature, however, needs to place greater emphasis on studying the factors influencing agricultural green development performance and how such performance can be improved. A theoretical framework for agricultural green development performance was constructed in this paper using the Super-SBM model, which considers undesirable outputs, to measure the agricultural green development performance of 330 cities at or above the prefecture level in China (excluding Tibet Autonomous Region, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan of China) from 2007 to 2018. Furthermore, the influencing mechanism of agricultural green development performance was then analyzed using a spatial econometric model. The results show that: 1) from 2007 to 2018, China's agricultural green development performance experienced three stages of evolution: 'rise, decline and rise'. 2) The regions with high performance agricultural green development are mainly distributed in eastern China, northeastern China, and southern Qinghai Province. 3) The agricultural economic level, industrialization process, and labor quality play significant roles in promoting local agricultural green development performance, while such performance is obviously inhibited by the openness level and the government's environmental regulations. Local agricultural green development performance is significant inhibited by the agricultural economic level and accelerated industrialization process in neighboring cities, while significantly promoted by the agricultural industrial structure in neighboring cities. Some suggestions for improving agricultural green development performance are proposed based on these research results, which can provide scientific references for promoting sustainable agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land is the space carrier for the existence and flow of other development factors. Activating rural land and promoting the circulation of other development factors through land management innovation is necessary to realize rural vitalization. This paper identifies the connotation of factor flow in the rural vitalization context, the action mechanism of land management innovation to boost the flow of development factors, the issues and obstacles restricting factor circulation, and the realization mechanism of the flow of development factors in rural vitalization. Based on the analytic paradigm constructed in the paper, the successful practice of promoting the flow of development factors through innovative land management in a model village is examined. The results show that: 1) the unreasonable systems characterized by the land use system in rural areas are the main obstacles causing circulation issues in development factors. It is essential to engage in comprehensive reform to break down these long-lasting obstacles to the smooth flow of development factors. 2) The land should play a leading role in the circulation of development factors in the background of rural vitalization; the main purpose of land management innovation is to activate the land factor, thereby promoting the circulation of other factors. 3) The activated land factor will act as a 'trigger' to promote capital and technology in rural settings and use capital and technology to attract the inflow of talents and the return of migrant workers, whereby the population factor will act as a 'catalyst' for the cultivation of rural culture, bringing about the integration of various development factors. 4) The innovation of land use and management, increased funding, and new technologies have brought multiple talents to Tengtou Village. The high-frequency mutual feedback between the village's own and the external development factors resulted in its successful integration of industrial development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reorganization of the global production network and the increased mobility of urban-rural elements have accelerated the differentiation of rural spaces, resulting in a trend towards specialization in rural areas. This paper focuses on the concept of specialization, and takes a renowned bonsai specialized village in Guangzhou City, China as a typical case to explore its transformation and development process, action logic and coupling mechanism with the social governance. The results show that: 1) the development of rural specialization in Ruiling Village is shaped by several key actors, such as local governments, grassroots organizations, villagers, social organizations, policies, markets and infrastructure. The transfer of these key actors and the reconstruction of actor-networks in different stages have an important influence on the transformation and realization of rural development goals. 2) Through subjects-driven, organization management and resource connection, social governance supports the specialization of rural industrial organization, operation, technology and mode. The governance structure shifts from decentralization to networking, refinement and integration. A coupling community of social governance and specialization is created by the social governance system of 'local government-grassroots organizations-economic cooperatives-villagers', which links industries, industrial chains and cooperatives. 3) Social governance integrates into the value chain extension process of rural specialized development with a central, multi-level organizational structure. It promotes the construction of the whole value chain through organizational planning, resource integration and image shaping, thus realizing the value, branding and organization of the industry, as well as the integration of rural sustainable development and governance mechanism. Social governance has a profound impact on the development of rural specialization in terms of subject, structure and mode, and participates in the construction of the whole value chain of rural areas. This paper provides a new perspective for understanding the coupling effect of social governance in the rural development transformation, and promotes the rural sustainable development and governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Karst environmental issues have become one of the hot spots in contemporary international geological research. The same problem of water shortage is one of the hot spots of global concern. The peak-cluster depression basins in southwest of Guangxi is an important water connotation and ecological barrier areas in the Pearl River Basin of China. Thus, studying the spatial and temporal variations and the influencing factors of its water yield services is critical to achieve the sustainable development of water resources and ecological environmental protection in this region. As such, this paper uses the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) model to assess the spatial and temporal variabilities of water yield services and its trends in the peak-cluster depression basins in southwest of Guangxi from 2000 to 2020. This work also integrates precipitation (Pre), reference evapotranspiration (ET), temperature (Tem), digital elevation model (DEM), slope, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), land use/land cover (LULC) and soil type to reveal the main factors that influence water yield services with the help of Geodetector. Results show that: 1) in time scale, the total annual water yield in the study area show a fluctuating and increasing trend from 2000 to 2020, with a growth rate of 7.3753 × 108 m3/yr, and its multi-year average water yield was 538.07 mm; 2) in spatial pattern, with high yield areas mainly distributed in the south of the study area (mainly including Shangsi County, Pingxiang City, Ningming County, Longzhou County and Jingxi County), and low yield areas mainly distributed in Baise City and Nanning City; 3) the dominant factor of water yield within karst and non-karst landforms is not necessarily controlled by precipitation, and the explanation degree of DEM factors in karst areas is significantly higher than that in non-karst areas; 4) amongst the climatic factors, Pre, ET and Tem are dominant in the spatial pattern of region water yield capacity. among which Pre has the highest explanatory power for the spatial heterogeneity of annual water production, with q values above 0.8, and each driver showed a significant interaction on the spatial distribution of water yield, with Pre exhibiting the strongest interaction with LULC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2000s has witnessed increasing interests in cities' role of innovation in the era of knowledge-based economy. Compared with substantial empirical analysis on the world city hierarchy of innovation, this paper attempts to examine the national urban hierarchy of innovation capability in China, in terms of ranking systems, spatial pattern and inter-city linkages of knowledge during the post-reform period since the late 1970s. Based on quantitative analysis such as principal component factor analysis and clustering analysis, this paper identifies the five-tier hierarchy of innovation, which is headed by Beijing and Shanghai, followed by the capital cities of each province and regional centre cities. The development of China's urban hierarchy of innovation capability has been driven by such factors as the scale of innovation, scientific scale, innovation potential and innovation environment. The paper further investigates the inter-city linkages of knowledge measured by the number of co-authored papers among the cities. Beijing is positioned in the central position of the knowledge diffusion and knowledge cooperation innovation. More knowledge diffusion among high level cities has occurred than that among the low level cities as well as between the low level cities and high level cities, and provincial capital cities and the regional central cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global value chains have become the core skeleton of the global economy. As a large-scale international cooperation initiative, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI hereafter) may have a significant impact on the global economic landscape. In this context, the spatiotemporal pattern and evolution of the value chain connection of the Silk Road countries and whether the BRI will promote the value chain connections between China and these countries are important research questions for understanding the changing global economic landscape. This paper employs input-output analysis, network analysis and difference-in-differences based on Propensity Score Matching (PSM-DID) to conduct an in-depth quantitative study of these questions. The results show that, first, the overall value chain connection between China and the Silk Road countries has been rising since 2001. From the perspective of geographical distribution, Southeast Asia is the highest value chain connection region with China, and the growth in the central and eastern Europe is the most significant, whereas the central Asia is the lowest value connection region. From the perspective of complex network analysis, China's position in the network of value flow among the Silk Road countries has been increasing continuously, and it has been in the lead position since 2008. Besides, the implementation of the BRI has had a significant positive influence on the overall value chain connection between China and the Silk Road countries, but this positive influence is limited to the central and eastern Europe region, whereas it is not significant in other regions. Finally, this paper suggests that to promote the development of value chain connection, the Silk Road countries need to develop more specific policies related to value chains. Policymakers need to be able to correctly identify the comparative advantages of the region and the types of value chains that are compatible with them and then find suitable partners and formulate targeted promotion policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public environmental concern (PEC) is an important bottom-up force in building an environmentally sustainable society. Guided by attitude theory, this paper innovatively constructed a PEC evaluation index system, while introducing entropy weighted-TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution) to realize the assessment of PEC. Exploratory spatial data analysis was used to portray the spatio-temporal evolution patterns of PEC in 362 Chinese cities at prefecture-level and above from 2011 to 2018. Furthermore, the Geodetector model was performed to identify the multi-dimensional determinants of PEC from the perspective of spatial heterogeneity. The results indicated that: 1) PEC in China exhibited a fluctuating upward trend, consistent with the spatial distribution law of 'Heihe-Tengchong Line' and 'Bole-Taipei Line'; 2) the driving effect of each factor varied dynamically, but in general, economic development level, population size, industrial wastewater, and education level were the dominant driving factors explaining the spatial variation of PEC; 3) risk detection revealed that four factors, government environmental regulations, PM2.5, vegetation coverage, and natural resource endowment, had nonlinear effects on PEC; 4) the interactions between factors all demonstrated an enhancement in explaining the spatial differentiation of PEC. PEC was driven by the comprehensive interaction of four-dimensional factors of economy, society, pollutant emissions, and ecology. Among them, population agglomeration accompanied by a high level of regional economy and information technology can explain the increase in PEC to the greatest extent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dislocation between regional innovation and economic development directly influences the economic effect of regional innovation. However, no in-depth researches have been made on how to solve this problem. Using data from Henan Province, China, employing geographical detector technology, this paper focuses on testing whether the industry-university-research cooperation can contribute to coordinating the relation between regional innovation and economic development. It is shown that: 1) the industry-university-research cooperation in Henan Province is increasing gradually, and the network presents a core-edge structure, and the coupling degree between regional innovation and economic development is spatially unbalanced, which is similar to the spatial distribution of the intensity of industry-university-research cooperation; 2) as an important approach to effectively connect scientific researches with market demands, the industry-university-research cooperation can help form an interactive, interconnected, coupled and coordinated virtuous relation between regional innovation and economic development. Compared with the cooperation between organizations of the same type and the separate innovation of organizations, the improvement of the industry-university-research cooperation level can better coordinate the relation between regional innovation and economic development; 3) the cooperative innovation model between enterprises and universities can better promote the coupling between regional innovation and economic development, compared with many industry-university-research cooperation models. For underdeveloped areas lacking local knowledge base, industry-university-research cooperation should be considered as a long-term development strategy, especially using the knowledge sources of external universities and scientific research institutions to enhance innovation capability and achieve economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three types of spatial function zoning is an effective measure for regional environmental protection and orderly development. For ecological and economic coordinated development, spatial function zones should be divided scientifically to clear its direction of development and protection. Therefore, based on ecological constraints, a beneficial discussion would be about the key ecological function areas adopting the concept of ecological protection restriction and supporting socioeconomic development for spatial function zoning. In this paper, the researchers, taking Tacheng Basin, Xinjiang of China as an example, choose township as basic research unit and set up an evaluation index system from three aspects, namely, ecological protection suitability, agricultural production suitability, and urban development suitability, which are analyzed by using spatial analysis functions and exclusive matrix method. The results showed that: 1) This paper formed a set of multilevel evaluation index systems for three types of spatial function zoning of the key ecological function areas based on a novel perspective by scientifically dividing Tacheng Basin into ecological space, agricultural space, and urban space, which realized the integration and scientific orientation for spatial function at the township scale. 2) Under the guidance of three types of spatial pattern, the functional orientation and suggestions of development and protection was clearly defined for ecological protection zones, ecological economic zones, agricultural production zones, and urban development zones. 3) A new idea of space governance is provided to promote the coordinated and sustainable development between ecology and economy, which can break the traditional mode of thinking about regional economic development, and offers a scientific basis and reference for macro decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since China's reform and opening up in 1978, the acceleration of industrialization and urbanization in China had led to dramatic changes in the pattern of urban-rural land use. In this paper, we focused on the rural industrialized areas in central China (Xinxiang County and Changyuan City of Henan Province). We used the average nearest neighbor index, spatial statistical analysis, and a structural equation model to analyze the spatiotemporal evolution and influencing factors of urban-rural construction land based on multi-source spatial data and survey data. The results showed that: 1) from 1975 to 2019, the spatial distribution of urban-rural construction land in rural industrialized areas had evolved from homogeneous distribution to local agglomeration. In terms of comparative analysis of cases, the spatial distribution of urban-rural construction land in Changyuan City had shown a trend from diffusion to agglomeration, and Xinxiang County had overall shown a spatial change from homogenization to agglomeration and then to regional integration development. 2) The hot spots with increased urban-rural construction land significantly expanded, and they had a high degree of spatial overlap with industrial development. Among them, Xinxiang County was concentrated in central and marginal areas, and Changyuan was mainly concentrated in central urban areas. 3) From the evolution of spatial proximity of urban-rural construction land, rural industrialized areas generally decline, showing the characteristics of internal differentiation in the rate of change. 4) Industrial development, social economy, the policy environment, and urban development played a positive role in promoting the expansion of urban-rural construction land in rural industrialized areas. To promote the optimal use of regional land and the integrated development of urban-rural areas, we should combine the advantages of regional endowment, formulate development strategies according to local conditions, and adjust the way that land is used in a timely manner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Addressing the issue of the healthy and coordinated development of the population and economic factors in rural areas will not only help consolidate and expand the achievements of poverty alleviation, but will also lay a foundation for comprehensive rural revitalization. In this paper, the spatial coupling relationship between the population and economic factors in rural areas in the Qinling-Daba Mountains, China, is explored to provide a reference for rural revitalization and regional sustainable development in poverty areas. Sixty-eight county units in rural areas in the Qinling-Daba Mountains, as well as the population and economic factors in rural areas, are used to study the spatial coupling relationship between population and economy, as well as the driving mechanism, in rural areas in the Qinling-Daba Mountains from 2010 to 2020. The results show that a population contraction phenomenon occurred in the rural areas in the Qinling-Daba Mountains, and the spatial agglomeration trends of the population and economic factors were consistent. The agglomeration was mainly located in the suburban areas of the municipal area, and the agglomeration degree was significantly higher in these areas than in other areas. In terms of the spatial distribution, the economic development level of the rural areas in the northeastern part of the Qinling-Daba Mountains was generally higher than that in the central and western parts, and the unbalanced trends of the population and economic spatial differentiation in the eastern and western regions were significant. The spatial coupling relationship between the population and economy changed from coordinated development to economic advancement. This was mainly due to the mutual restriction and joint actions of the industrial structure, capital situation, natural environment, policies, and institutional regulations, among which the industrial structure and capital status had significant effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Settlements and cultivated land are important production and living spaces in promoting rural revitalization. However, few studies have explored the relationship between rural settlements and cultivated land from spatiotemporal interaction perspective. This paper analyzed the spatiotemporal conversion and the interactive mechanism between rural settlements and cultivated land in a karst mountainous area (Qixingguan District of Guizhou Province) with fragile ecological environment in China during 2009–2018. The results showed that the expansion of rural settlements and the loss of cultivated land coexisted in Qixingguan District. Only 2.68% of the new cultivated land was reclaimed from rural settlements, whereas 85.45% of the new rural settlements occupied cultivated land. Six spatial expansion modes of rural settlements when occupying cultivated land were identified. Among these six modes, the area of the edge-expansion & along traffic roads (EA) mode accounted for 52.75%. The occupation by rural settlements made the cultivated land landscape more fragmented. The area ratio index of cultivated land to rural settlements (ARICR) of Qixingguan District averaged 18.75 in 2009 and 17.21 in 2018, respectively. The ARICR reduced in all township administrative regions. Cultivated land with suitable slope condition for farming or without rocky desertification was more likely to be occupied by rural settlements. The probability of cultivated land occupied by rural settlements increased with the decrease of the distance to traffic roads, towns, and old rural settlements. The better the economic and social development of the township administrative regions, the more the ARICR decreased, while the richer the agricultural resources and the better the rural development of the township administrative regions, the less the ARICR decreased. The optimal reconstruction path of rural settlements, the comprehensive conservation path of cultivated land and the urban-rural integration development path in karst mountainous area were proposed. The findings would contribute to our understanding of the spatiotemporal interaction between rural settlements and cultivated land, and would provide a theoretical basis for promoting the coordinated development of rural man-land relationship and rural revitalization in karst areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploring the synergy types and optimization paths between Poverty Alleviation Effectiveness and Rural Revitalization is necessary for achieving the two centenary goals. Taking poverty alleviation counties in Hunan Province, China as an example, our study proposed an indicator to measure the synergistic development between Poverty Alleviation Effectiveness and Rural Revitalization using the multi-index integrated evaluation method. Then, the coupling types were classified based on both the proposed indicator and regional characteristics. Besides, the corresponding optimization path for each coupling type was proposed to promote the synergistic development of Poverty Alleviation and Rural Revitalization. Results are as follows: 1) Lower synergy focused on the southwestern Hunan, while low synergy is widely distributed (such as the west, southwest, northwest, and midland). Moderate synergy is in the midland, such as Huaihua and Chenzhou cities. High synergy is distributed in Yongzhou, Huaihua, Xiangxi cities, etc. Besides, only Hecheng City belongs to the higher synergy. 2) This paper proposes corresponding development paths for different development characteristics and main problems from multiple perspectives of the protection system, industrial planning, and rural market. Continuously consolidate and enhance the effectiveness of Poverty Alleviation and Rural Revitalization to achieve coupled and synergistic development of the two systems. Our research results can provide theoretical support for implementing Poverty Alleviation and Rural Revitalization in Hunan Province, China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soil moisture plays an important role in crop yield estimation, irrigation management, etc. Remote sensing technology has potential for large-scale and high spatial soil moisture mapping. However, offline remote sensing data processing is time-consuming and resource-intensive, and significantly hampers the efficiency and timeliness of soil moisture mapping. Due to the high-speed computing capabilities of remote sensing cloud platforms, a High Spatial Resolution Soil Moisture Estimation Framework (HSRSMEF) based on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform was developed in this study. The functions of the HSRSMEF include research area and input datasets customization, radar speckle noise filtering, optical-radar image spatio-temporal matching, soil moisture retrieving, soil moisture visualization and exporting. This paper tested the performance of HSRSMEF by combining Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 images and in-situ soil moisture data in the central farmland area of Jilin Province, China. Reconstructed Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) based on the Savitzky-Golay algorithm conforms to the crop growth cycle, and its correlation with the original NDVI is about 0.99 (P < 0.001). The soil moisture accuracy of the random forest model (R2 = 0.942, RMSE = 0.013 m3/m3) is better than that of the water cloud model (R2 = 0.334, RMSE = 0.091 m3/m3). HSRSMEF transfers time -consuming offline operations to cloud computing platforms, achieving rapid and simplified high spatial resolution soil moisture mapping. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building a more resilient response system to climate change for sustainable development and reducing uncertainty in China's food markets, requires access to historical research gaps and mapping future research progress for decision making. However, the lack of quantitative and objective analyses to ensure the stability and development of agroecosystems increases the complexity of agro-climatic mechanisms, which leads to uncertainty and undesirable consequences. In this paper, we review the characteristics of climate change in China (1951–2020), reveal the mechanisms of agroecosystem structure in response to climate, and identify challenges and opportunities for future efforts in the context of research progress. The aim is to improve the scientific validity and relevance of future research by clarifying agro-climatic response mechanisms. The results show that surface temperature, precipitation, and frequency of extreme weather events have increased to varying degrees in major agricultural regions of China in 1951–2020. And they have strong geographic variation, which has resulted in droughts in the north and floods in the south. Moreover, climate change has complicated the mechanisms of soil moisture, Net Primary Productivity (NPP), soil carbon pool, and crop pest structure in agroecosystems. This lends to a reduction in soil water holding capacity, NPP, soil carbon content, and the number of natural enemies of diseases and insects, which in turn affects crop yields. However, human interventions can mitigate the deterioration of these factors. We have also realized that the methodology and theory of historical research poses a great challenge to future agroecosystem. Historical and projected climate trends identified current gaps in interdisciplinary integration and multidisciplinary research required to manage diverse spatio-temporal climate change impacts on agroecosystems. Future efforts should highlight integrated management and decision making, multidisciplinary big data coupling, and numerical simulations to ensure sustainable agricultural development, ecological security, and food security in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to achieve a rapid and accurate identification of soil stratification information and accelerate the development of smart agriculture, this paper conducted soil stratification experiments on agricultural soils in the Mollisols area of Northeast China using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) and obtained different types of soil with frequencies of 500 MHz, 250 MHz, and 100 MHz antennas. The soil profile data were obtained for 500 MHz, 250 MHz, and 100 MHz antennas, and the dielectric properties of each type of soil were analyzed. In the image processing procedure, wavelet analysis was first used to decompose the pre-processed radar signal and reconstruct the high-frequency information to obtain the reconstructed signal containing the stratification information. Secondly, the reconstructed signal is taken as an envelope to enhance the stratification information. The Hilbert transform is applied to the envelope signal to find the time-domain variation of the instantaneous frequency and determine the time-domain location of the stratification. Finally, the dielectric constant of each soil horizon is used to obtain the propagation velocity of the electromagnetic wave at the corresponding position to obtain the stratification position of each soil horizon. The research results show that the 500 MHz radar antenna can accurately delineate Ap/Ah, horizon and the absolute accuracy of the stratification is within 5 cm. The effect on the soil stratification below the tillage horizon is not apparent, and the absolute accuracy of the 250 MHz and 100 MHz radar antennas on the stratification is within 9 cm. The overwhelming majority of the overall calculation errors are kept to within 15%. Based on the three central frequency antennas, the soil horizon detection rate reaches 93.3%, which can achieve accurate stratification of soil profiles within 1 m. The experimental and image processing methods used are practical and feasible; however, the GPR will show a missed detection for soil horizons with only slight differences in dielectric properties. Overall, this study can quickly and accurately determine the information of each soil stratification, ultimately providing technical support for acquiring soil configuration information and developing smart agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the transformation of China's industry and demographic structure, urban shrinkage, especially the resource-based cities due to their single industrial structure, tend to emerge gradually. Using empirical and quantitative methods, this paper explores the evolution mechanism of urban shrinkage in Hegang, a resource-based city in China. Our findings suggest that there are many correlations or cyclic relationships among variables, which provide an empirical confirmation for the complexity of urban shrinkage process. The result shows there is a time delay of about four to five years between the mining industry and the changes of demographic profile, economic performance and built environment variables. The development of Hegang has formed a path dependence on resource-based industries. Furthermore, the time lags between demographic profile and economic performance variables are not obvious, and the real estate market has a certain sensitivity to perceive population loss and economic change. Besides, market led public service facilities are more sensitive to the changes of population outflow and economic recession than government led public service facilities. The study findings could offer insights for other resource-based cities in developing countries to employ on the economic development policies issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on urban physical space and theory of landscape ecology, a triune assessment framework —'size-density-morphology'—was constructed in order to analyze the spatial pattern and the scale effect of urban resilience in Shenyang of China in 2015, and to explore the main impact factors of landscape under different spatial scale backgrounds. The results show that: 1) Urban resilience is an optimal combination of the resilience of size, density, and morphology. The urban resilience of Shenyang displays scale effect; the overall resilience level increases with the increase in scale, while the spatial difference and spatial similarity tend to decrease resilience. 2) As 2 km, 1 km and 2 km are scale inflection points of average value curves for size resilience, density resilience and morphology resilience, respectively in an urban setting; the optimal scale unit of comprehensive resilience is 1 km. Choosing 1 km–2 km as the basic spatial scale better depicts overall pattern and detailed characteristics of resilience in Shenyang. The spatial amplitudes of 0.5 km and 1 km are sensitive points for spatial autocorrelation of morphology and density resilience, size, and comprehensive resilience to scale effect. 3) The major landscape factors of urban size and morphology resilience transform with scale expansion. Aggregation index (AI) has a significant impact on urban resilience at different scales; its influence increases significantly with the increase in scale. 4) The high-level area of comprehensive resilience in Shenyang is the eastern ecological corridor area, while the low value area is the peripheral extension area of the city. To promote the overall level of resilience in Shenyang, this paper argues that the construction of ecological infrastructure should be strengthened in the peripheral extension area in a balanced manner. In the city center, population and building density should be controlled; the intensity of human activities should be reduced; impetus should be placed on landscape heterogeneity; and the homogeneous expansion of the area of construction should be prevented. In the eastern ecological corridors, the exploitation of ecosystem lands should be strictly controlled, and the integrity of the green landscape patches should be maintained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spatial interaction model is an effective way to explore the geographical disparities inherent in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) by simulating spatial flows. The traditional gravity model implies the hypothesis of equilibrium points without any reference to when or how to achieve it. In this paper, a dynamic gravity model was established based on the Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) theory to estimate and monitor the interconnection intensity and dynamic characters of bilateral relations. In order to detect the determinants of interconnection intensity, a Geodetector method was applied to identify and evaluate the determinants of spatial networks in five dimensions. The empirical study clearly demonstrates a heterogeneous and non-circular spatial structure. The main driving forces of spatial-temporal evolution are foreign direct investment, tourism and railway infrastructure construction, while determinants in different sub-regions show obvious spatial differentiation. Southeast Asian countries are typically multi-island area where aviation infrastructure plays a more important role. North and Central Asian countries regard oil as a pillar industry where power and port facilities have a greater impact on the interconnection. While Western Asian countries are mostly influenced by the railway infrastructure, Eastern European countries already have relatively robust infrastructure where tariff policies provide a greater impetus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the trends of Chinese rural transformation development, and the sustainable development goals for resources and environment, reasonable arranging the potential development space and the ecological space, so as to optimize the distributions of rural settlement would be the key challenge for rural areas in ecologically fragile regions. From the perspective of maintaining regional ecological security, this paper takes Da'an City, a typical ecological fragile region in Jilin Province, as the case area, constructing the comprehensive ecological security pattern (ESP) on basis of landscape ecology, and applying the landscape pattern indexes to quantitative analysis the spatial distribution characteristics of rural settlements. Then, different optimization directions and management strategies are put forward for rural settlements in each secure zone under the comprehensive ESP. The experimental results showed that 1) the area of the low security zone, the general security zone, the moderate security zone and the extreme security zone was 1570.18 km2, 1463.36 km2, 1215.80 km2 and 629.77 km2, representing 32.18%, 29.99%, 24.92% and 12.91% of the total area of the target area, respectively. 2) The rural settlements in Da'an City were characterized by a high degree of fragmentation with a large number of small-scale patches. 3) The area of rural settlements in the ecological relocation zone, the in situ remediation zone, the limited development zone and the key development zone was 22.80 km2, 42.31 km2, 36.28 km2 and 19.40 km2, accounting for 18.88%, 35.03%, 30.04% and 16.06% of the total area of rural settlements, respectively. Then, different measures were proposed for settlements in different optimization zones in order to scientifically plan important ecological space, production space and living space in rural areas. This paper aims to provide fundamental support for rural settlements based on redistribution from the perspective of landscape ecology and provide insights for rural planning and rural habitat environmental improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to examine the effect of agglomeration on firm level productivity in Iran's food manufacturing by employing a firm level dataset during 1986–2015 among firms for four districts. The empirical results show that agglomeration in north districts are key factors in productivity growth. In this work, we apply a spatial Bayes model that uses hierarchical techniques during the three terms. The productivity clustering map is able to capture such patterns as the high productivity area that appears in the south, north districts of Iran. This paper evaluates the effect of agglomeration on firm productivity in Iran's food industries at district level. We find that regional market potential is the strong predictor of productivity; moreover, industrial agglomeration has a productivity-augmenting impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biodiversity offsetting plays a crucial role in managing the impacts of development on natural habitats. Developers, conservation groups, governments and financial institutions have used biodiversity offsetting to design measurable conservation actions to compensate for significant residual adverse biodiversity impacts arising from development. However, the concepts and methodologies of biodiversity offsetting have rarely been systematically reviewed, and best practices are still lacking. This hinders the development and applications of this field, and makes it difficult for new researchers to learn, develop, and apply biodiversity offsetting. This paper aims to review research progress on biodiversity offsetting during the period of 1992 to 2019. We mainly used bibliometric analysis and social network analysis methods to expose the topic diversity, development and promotion of this research field, and assess collaboration among biodiversity offsetting scholars. Our research identified 1190 records, and revealed that the total number of publications increased rapidly since 2002. The most productive journal, country, and author were Biological Conservation, USA, and Dr. Maron M of University of Queensland, respectively. Co-author analysis identified that the 23 authors most relevant to biodiversity offsetting were involved in a collaboration network. And they were mainly from 30 countries in a collaboration network, and the authors from USA, Australia and the United Kingdom have the most cooperation, which mainly driven by policy related to biodiversity offsetting. Our review shows that biodiversity offsetting research is at an early stage of rapid development with topically diverse and collaborative science domains. The majority of studies focus on terrestrial environments, which makes the implementation of aquatic ecosystem is more difficult. Theoretical problems and the implications of research evolution and social network in biodiversity offsetting are discussed, and further development of the theory and methodologies of biodiversity offsetting and management was recommend. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an important step enhancing regional innovation, researches on collaborative innovation have attracted much more attention recently. One significant reason is that cities can get excessive benefits while they take collaborative innovation activities. Based on the theories of innovation geography, this paper takes the collaborative innovation of the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) Urban Agglomeration as a case study and measures the collaborative innovation capacity from innovation actors and innovation cities by adopting the catastrophe progression model. Then on this basis, the study depicts the spatial pattern and the benefit allocation of collaborative innovation by using the coupling collaborative degree model and benefit allocation model of collaborative innovation. The results show that: 1) The collaborative innovation capacity of cities in the Yangtze River Delta has strengthened largely, while the capacity still is not high enough. Cities with high collaborative innovation capacity are concentrated in Shanghai, the southern part of Jiangsu, and Hangzhou Bay, yet the cooperation of the universities-industries-research institutes need to improve. 2) The spatial pattern of collaborative innovation of the Yangtze River Delta presents several innovation circles, which are in Suzhou-Wuxi-Changzhou Metropolitan Circle, Nanjing Metropolitan Circle, Hangzhou Metropolitan Circle, Ningbo Metropolitan Circle, and Hefei Metropolitan Circle. Shanghai plays the role of the central city of collaborative innovation, while Suzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Ningbo, and Hefei act as sub-central cities. 3) The benefit each city allocated from collaborative innovation activities has increased. However, the allocations of the benefit show that cities with higher innovation capacity have significant advantages in most cases, which lead to serious disparities in space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP) is the most unique region of human-land relations, and its main factor is population. By building a population and space dataset of the QTP at the township level from 1982 to 2017, this paper presents the pattern evolvement and regional distribution characteristics of township-level population in the QTP in detail for the first time. By using Geodetector method to analyze the influencing factors of township-level population change in the QTP, this paper provides scientific foundations for studying the Third Pole, ecological environment protection of the QTP, and human-land relations. The conclusions are as follows: 1) The population spatial distribution is not balanced at the township level, presents the regional differentiation characteristics of 'dense in southeast and sparse in northwest' along the 'Qilian-Jilong Line', and demonstrates the phenomenon of population center of gravity moving to the hinterland of the plateau at an accelerated speed; 2) The township-level population develops in a decentralized trend in general, and the cold- and hot-spot distribution of population has prominent spatial distribution characteristics. The population hot spots are concentrated in the surrounding areas of Xining, Golmud, Hotan and Lijiang; 3) The population of the QTP is increasing, and the inter-annual change of township population has a relatively stable regional regularity; 4) The level of per capita income is the leading factor in the change of township population, and its effect intensity is increasing continuously. The relative effect intensity of urbanization level and location conditions on population change has decreased significantly after 2000. The adaptability of living environment, such as topography and climate, has little influence on population change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For mankind's survival and development, water, energy, and food (WEF) are essential material guarantees. In China, however, the spatial distribution of WEF is seriously unbalanced and mismatched. Here, a collaborative governance mechanism that aims at nexus security needs to be urgently established. In this paper, the Yellow River Basin in China with a representative WEF system, was selected as a case. Firstly, a comprehensive framework for WEF coupling coordination was constructed, and the relationship and mechanism between them were analyzed theoretically. Then, we investigated the spatiotemporal characteristics and driving mechanisms of the coupling coordination degree (CCD) with a composite evaluation method, coupling coordination degree model, spatial statistical analysis, and multiscale geographic weighted regression. Finally, policy implications were discussed to promote the coordinated development of the WEF system. The results showed that: 1) WEF subsystems showed a significant imbalance of spatial pattern and diversity in temporal changes; 2) the CCD for the WEF system varied little and remained at moderate coordination. Areas with moderate coordination have increased, while areas with superior coordination and mild disorder have decreased. In addition, the spatial clustering phenomenon of the CCD was significant and showed obvious characteristics of polarization; and 3) the action of each factor is self-differentiated and regionally variable. For different factors, GDP per capita was of particular importance, which contributed most to the regional development's coupling coordination. For different regions, GDP per capita, average yearly precipitation, population density, and urbanization rate exhibited differences in geographical gradients in an east-west direction. The conclusion can provide references for regional resource allocation and sustainable development by enhancing WEF system utilization efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study constructs a quasi-natural experiment based on the expansion of the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration (YRDUA) of China in 2010 to investigate the impact and inner mechanism of urban agglomeration expansion on fine particulate matter (PM2.5) concentrations through propensity scores in difference-in-differences models (PSM-DID) using panel data from 286 prefecture-level cities in China from 2003 to 2016. The results show that 1) urban agglomeration expansion contributes to an overall decrease in PM2.5 concentration, which is mainly achieved from the original cities. For the new cities, on the other hand, the expansion significantly increases the local PM2.5 concentration. 2) In the long term, the significant influence of urban agglomeration expansion on PM2.5 concentration lasts for three years and gradually decreases. A series of robustness tests confirm the applicability of the PSM-DID model. 3) Cities with weaker government regulation, a better educated population and higher per capita income present stronger PM2.5 reduction effects. 4) Urban agglomeration expansion affects the PM2.5 concentration mainly through industrial transfer and population migration, which cause a decrease in the PM2.5 concentration in the original cities and an increase in the PM2.5 concentration in the new cities. Corresponding policy suggestions are proposed based on the conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban functional area (UFA) is a core scientific issue affecting urban sustainability. The current knowledge gap is mainly reflected in the lack of multi-scale quantitative interpretation methods from the perspective of human-land interaction. In this paper, based on multi-source big data include 250 m × 250 m resolution cell phone data, 1.81 × 105 Points of Interest (POI) data and administrative boundary data, we built a UFA identification method and demonstrated empirically in Shenyang City, China. We argue that the method we built can effectively identify multi-scale multi-type UFAs based on human activity and further reveal the spatial correlation between urban facilities and human activity. The empirical study suggests that the employment functional zones in Shenyang City are more concentrated in central cities than other single functional zones. There are more mix functional areas in the central city areas, while the planned industrial new cities need to develop comprehensive functions in Shenyang. UFAs have scale effects and human-land interaction patterns. We suggest that city decision makers should apply multi-sources big data to measure urban functional service in a more refined manner from a supply-demand perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid development of urban agglomerations in northwest arid and semiarid regions of China, the scope of the urban heat island (UHI) effect has gradually expanded and gradually connected, and has formed a regional heat island (RHI) with a larger range of impact to the regional environment. However, there are few studies on the heat island effect of urban agglomerations in arid and semiarid regions, so this paper selects the urban agglomeration of Hohhot, Baotou and Ordos (HBO) of Inner Mongolia, China as the study area. Based on the 8-day composite Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) surface temperature data (156 scenes in all) and land use maps for 2005, 2010, and 2015, we analyze the spatiotemporal distributions of regional heat (cool) islands (RH(C)I) and the responses of surface temperatures to land-use changes in the diurnal and interannual surface cities. The results showed that: 1) from 2005 to 2015, urban areas showed the cold island effect during the day, with the area of the cold island showing a shrinking feature; at night, they showed the heat island effect, with the area of the heat island showing a first decrease and then an increase. 2) From 2005 to 2015, the land development (unutilized land to building land) brings the greatest temperature increase (ΔT = 1.36°C) during the day, while the greatest temperature change at night corresponds to the conversion of cultivated land to building land (ΔT = 0.78°C) exhibited the largest changes at night. From 2010 to 2015, the land development (grassland to building land) bring the greatest temperature increase (ΔT = 0.85°C) during the day, while the great temperature change at night corresponds to the conversion of water areas to building land (ΔT = 1.38°C) exhibited the largest changes at night. Exploring the spatial and temporal evolution of surface urban heat (cool) islands in urban agglomerations in arid and semiarid regions will help to understand the urbanization characteristics of urban agglomerations and provide a reference for the formulation of policies for the coordinated and healthy development of the region and co-governance of regional environmental problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evapotranspiration (ET) is the key to the water cycle process and an important factor for studying near-surface water and heat balance. Accurately estimating ET is significant for hydrology, meteorology, ecology, agriculture, etc. This paper simulates ET in the Madu River Basin of Three Gorges Reservoir Area of China during 2009–2018 based on the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model, which was calibrated and validated using the MODIS (Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer)/Terra Net ET 8-Day L4 Global 500 m SIN Grid (MOD16A2) dataset and measured ET. Two calibration strategies (lumped calibration (LC) and spatially distributed calibration (SDC)) were used. The basin was divided into 34 sub-basins, and the coefficient of determination (R2) and Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency coefficient (NSE) of each sub-basin were greater than 0.6 in both the calibration and validation periods. The R2 and NSE were higher in the validation period than those in the calibration period. Compared with the measured ET, the accuracy of the model on the daily scale is: R2 = 0.704 and NSE = 0.759 (SDC results). The model simulation accuracy of LC and SDC for the sub-basin scale was R2 = 0.857, R2 = 0.862 (monthly) and R2 = 0.227, R2 = 0.404 (annually), respectively; for the whole basin scale was R2 = 0.902, R2 = 0.900 (monthly) and R2 = 0.507 and R2 = 0.519 (annually), respectively. The model performed acceptably, and SDC performed the best, indicating that remote sensing data can be used for SWAT model calibration. During 2009–2018, ET generally increased in the Madu River Basin (SDC results, 7.21 mm/yr), with a multiyear average value of 734.37 mm/yr. The annual ET change rate for the sub-basin was relatively low upstream and downstream. The linear correlation analysis between ET and meteorological factors shows that on the monthly scale, precipitation, solar radiation and daily maximum and minimum temperature were significantly correlated with ET; annually, solar radiation and wind speed had a moderate correlation with ET. The correlation between maximum temperature and ET is best on the monthly scale (Pearson correlation coefficient R = 0.945), which may means that the increasing ET originating from increasing temperature (global warming). However, the sub-basins near Shennongjia Nature Reserve that are in upstream have a negative ET change rate, which means that ET decreases in these sub-basins, indicating that the ‘Evaporation Paradox’ exists in these sub-basins. This study explored the potential of remote-sensing-based ET data for hydrological model calibration and provides a decision-making reference for water resource management in the Madu River Basin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investigating urban expansion patterns aids in the management of urbanization and in ameliorating the socioeconomic and environmental issues associated with economic transformation and sustainable development. Applying Harmonized Defense Meteorological Satellite Program-Operational Line-scan System (DMSP-OLS) and the Suomi National Polar-Orbiting Partnership-Visible Infrared Imagery Radiometer Suite (NPP-VIIRS) Nighttime Light (NTL) data, this paper investigated the characteristics of urban landscape in West Africa. Using the harmonized NTL data, spatial comparison and empirical threshold methods were employed to detect urban changes from 1993 to 2018. We examined the rate of urban change and calculated the direction of the urban expansion of West Africa using the center-of-gravity method for urban areas. In addition, we used the landscape expansion index method to assess the processes and stages of urban growth in West Africa. The accuracy of urban area extraction based on NTL data were R2 = 0.8314 in 2000, R2 = 0.8809 in 2006, R2 = 0.9051 in 2012 for the DMSP-OLS and the simulated NPP-VIIRS was R2 = 0.8426 in 2018, by using Google Earth images as validation. The results indicated that there was a high rate and acceleration of urban landscapes in West Africa, with rates of 0.016 0, 0.017 3, 0.018 9, and 0.068 6, and accelerations of 0.31, 0.42, 0.54, and 0.90 for the periods of 1998–2003, 2003–2008, 2008–2013, and 2013–2018, respectively. The expansion direction of urban agglomeration in West Africa during 1993–2018 was mainly from the coast to inland. However, cities located in the Sahel Region of Africa and in the middle zone expanded from north to south. Finally, the results showed that the urban landscape of West Africa was mainly in a scattered and disordered 'diffusion' process, whereas only a few cities located in coastal areas experiencing the process of 'coalescence' according to urban growth phase theory. This study provides urban planners with relevant insights for the urban expansion characteristics of West Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]