Effects of Land Use Changes on Ecosystem Service Value in Xiangjiang River Basin, China

The study of land use and land cover (LULC) change and the evolution of ecosystem service values (ESV) is important for optimizing the allocation of regional land resources and achieving sustainable development, but traditional land use analysis methods cannot dig deeper into the information on the internal transitions between different land types. Therefore, in this paper, we use the component analysis and Intensity Analysis methods to systematically analyze the land use landscape changes at multiple levels. In addition, the spatial and temporal dynamic characteristics of ESV in the Xiangjiang River Basin are carved with the help of equivalence factors and GIS spatial analysis methods, which reveal the response of ESV changes to land use changes in the Xiangjiang River Basin in the past four decades. Our results showed that, (1) in the past 40 years, the intensity of land use change in the Xiangjiang River Basin has been increasing, mainly in quantity and shift. The increase of built-up and bare land and the decrease of cultivated land are stable and active, and the loss of forest land is large, but it is dormant. The loss of cultivated and forested land flows mainly to built-up land. (2) In the Xiangjiang River Basin, ESV increases first and then decreases, mainly in the middle and high grades and changes faster in the east. (3) The cross-sensitivity coefficient reflected that the net conversion of cultivated land to forest land and water area had a promoting effect on ESV. Our results provide important knowledge to inform land use decisions and facilitate sustainable development in the Xiangjiang River Basin.