Impact on local sustainability of the northward expansion of human activities into protected areas in northern Tibet
2022
Fan, Jie | Liang, Bo | Liu, Hanchu | Wang, Yafei | Zhao, Yannan | Zhang, Haipeng | Liu, Baoyin | Chen, Dong
The negative marginal effect of spatial expansion of human activities on the ecology is increasing, which could easily lead to unsustainable development. However, the reasons for the expansion process and the combined impact on the ecosystem health of protected areas and the sustainable livelihoods of local residents are still vaguely known. Northern Tibet has important ecological service functions such as water conservation, windbreak and sand fixation, and plateau biodiversity, and is an ecological security barrier on a global scale. Based on multi‐source data, this study describes the changing process of the boundary of human activities in northern Tibet. By establishing a sustainable living equilibrium model, using spatial analysis and the transformation measurement method, the causes of human activities encroaching on protected areas and their impact on ecology and pastoralist livelihoods are explored. The results showed that the boundary of grazing moved 118.7 km northward to the Qiangtang Protected Area from 1980 to 2015, resulting in the theoretical livestock carrying capacity of grasslands decreased by 5.4%, the overgrazing worsened by 6.8%, and the living standard of pastoralists widened with that of the whole Country. The factors leading to the expansion include population increase and consumption demand, increases in wildlife, lake expansion and grassland degeneration. The pastoralists' excessive dependence on animal husbandry is the main reason, contributing to more than 65% of the northward expansion. The feasible way to change this local unsustainable development is to make rational use of the ecological tourism function and service value of the protected areas.
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