Ronny Berndtsson
Professor, Dep Director, MECW Dep Scientific Coordinator
Ndvi dynamics and its response to climate change and reforestation in Northern China
Author
Summary, in English
Vegetation is an important component of the terrestrial ecosystem that plays an essential role in the exchange of water and energy in climate and biogeochemical cycles. This study investigated the spatiotemporal variation of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) in northern China using the GIMMS-MODIS NDVI during 1982–2018. We explored the dominant drivers of NDVI change using regression analyses. Results show that the regional average NDVI for northern China increased at a rate of 0.001 year−1. NDVI improved and degraded area corresponded to 36.1% and 9.7% of the total investigated area, respectively. Climate drivers were responsible for NDVI change in 46.2% of the study area, and the regional average NDVI trend in the region where the dominant drivers were temperature (T), precipitation (P), and the combination of precipitation and temperature (P&T), increased at a rate of 0.0028, 0.0027, and 0.0056 year−1, respectively. We conclude that P has positive dominant effects on NDVI in the subregion VIAiia, VIAiic, VIAiib, VIAib of temperate grassland region, and VIIBiia of temperate desert region in northern China. T has positive dominant effects on NDVI in the alpine vegetation region of Qinghai Tibet Plateau. NDVI is negatively dominated by T in the subregion VIIBiib, VIIBib, VIIAi, and VIIBi of temperate desert regions. Human activities affect NDVI directly by reforestation, especially in Shaanxi, Shanxi, and Hebei provinces.
Department/s
- Centre for Advanced Middle Eastern Studies (CMES)
- MECW: The Middle East in the Contemporary World
- Division of Water Resources Engineering
- LTH Profile Area: Water
Publishing year
2020
Language
English
Publication/Series
Remote Sensing
Volume
12
Issue
24
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
MDPI AG
Topic
- Physical Geography
- Climate Research
Keywords
- Climate driver
- NDVI
- Reforestation area
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 2072-4292