An analysis of land use conflict potentials based on ecological-production-living function in the southeast coastal area of China

The rapid advancement of urbanization and industrialization has led to the continuous strengthening of multi-functionality of land use. The overlapping, crowding, agglomeration and transformation of various land use functions suggested that there would be fierce competition and conflicts. Based on the widely recognized “ecological-production-living” perspective of sustainable development in the world, we constructed the spatial identification and intensity diagnosis model of potential land use function conflicts (LUFCs), and selected Nan’an City, a typical coastal city in southeast China, as an empirical analysis. On the level of theoretical building, the LUFCs were divided into eight types, the conflict intensity was divided into four stages, and a land use conflict risk index (LUCRI) was constructed to characterize the possibility of potential conflict, which was divided into four ranks. Empirical research showed that the spatial concentration characteristic of ecological function of land use in Nan’an City was not significant and was poor spatial connectivity, while the gradient and band feature of production function was significant and was good spatial connectivity, and living function have formed three core clusters. The controllable conflict zones gathered and formed cold spots in high altitude forest areas, as well as the out-of-control conflict zones gathering and forming hot spots in concentrated areas of social and economic activities. The area proportions of different conflict types respectively were 1.79%, 18.07%, 23.17%, 13.49%, 8.00%, 13.66%, 20.34% and 1.49%. The whole study area was basically at risk of potential conflicts, with the area proportions accounting for 55.28%, 30.19%, 12.30% and 2.23%. Different governance strategies should be adopted according to the spatial distribution, manifestation and conflict degree. The model and index constructed in this paper could accurately reflect the actual situation of land use in fast-growing areas, which would provide reference for land space planning and management.