Construction of ecological security patterns based on ecological red line in Erhai Lake Basin of southwestern China

ObjectiveBuilding comprehensive ecological security pattern to solve ecological problems is an important way to achieve regional sustainable development. Ecological red line is the base line of national and regional ecological security, and it also plays an important role in maintaining regional ecological security. Building an ecological security pattern also provides a scientific basis for the management of land resource and ecosystem in Erhai Lake Basin of southwestern China.

MethodTaking Erhai Lake Basin as object in this study, we designed the ecological red line by means of evaluating the biodiversity protection and water conservation. Based on land suitability evaluation, we took the ecological red line area as the ecological source and established the minimum resistance model to construct the ecological security pattern.

ResultAccording to the ecosystem service function of the ecological red line area, Erhai Lake Basin was divided into "biodiversity protection ecological red line area", "biodiversity protection-water conservation ecological red line area" and "water conservation ecological red line area", which were 81.92, 656.37 and 536.06 km², occupied 3.15%, 25.24% and 20.62% of the total area of the study area, respectively. The comprehensive ecological security pattern of Erhai Lake Babin was composed of ecological sources, three kinds of buffer zones with high, medium and low level, 47 ecological corridors and 14 ecological nodes. The area of high, medium and low level buffer zones was 359.88, 294.9 and 1 945.42 km², accounted for 13.84%, 11.34% and 74.82% of the total area, respectively.

ConclusionAccording to the spatial correspondence between land use types and biodiversity, water conservation function, selecting assessment factors to define the ecological red line provides practical reference for the division of regional ecological red line. Selecting ecological sources based on ecological red line is not only accurate and comprehensive, but also provides practical reference to design ecological red line and application to build ecological security patterns.