A Study on Nature Reserve Geographic Information System in Xishuangbanna
Li Hongga, Cui Weihong
(Institution of Remote Sensing Application, CAS)
P. O. Box 9718, Beiging, 100101, P. R. C.
Li Zhixi
(Institute of Remote Sensing & GIS, Southwest Forestry College)
Kunming, 650224, P. R.C.
Abstract:
The protection of forest, especially tropical rain forest which has great economic and ecological effects, is a major task in the world. In this paper, we offer an approach to protect and manage tropical rain forest in Xishuangbanna nature reserves by using Geographic Information System. The study not only provided the basic spatial database, but also evaluated the qualities of nature reserves and environment e.g. soil erosion and elephant habitat and developed regional plans for the forest fire risk and agroforest. Through the practical application, the GIS priority has been established in the work of the management of nature reserves and villagers' sustainable development. The results demonstrated the potential for applying GIS for nature reserves and sustainable development as well as the effect of the integration of Remote Sensing, GIS and Sampling.
Keywords :
Geographic Information System, Sustainable Development, Remote Sensing
1. Introduction
The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) which took place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 3-14 June 1992, represented the threshold of a fundamental change in the attitudes towards environment preservation and sustainable development, signed the 21st Century Agenda and Biodiversity Convention, which put forward hat the protection of natural environment and resources is imperative and important to safeguard the basic heritage of mankind and the quality of the earth environment, not only for the present but also for the future. The function of forest, especially the tropical primitive forest, which is regarded as the main component of the earth environment and the valuable natural resource, has been more and more paid attention by the world. It has been learned from painful experience throughout the world's humid tropics that it is generally disastrous to cut tropical forest for wood or to replace them with monocultures either as crops or as plantations. The result is not only the loss of the precious tropical rainforest and biodiversity, but also the challenge to cultivate and develop in tropics.
This problem occurs in Xishuangbanna, the southern prefecture of the Chinese province Yunnan, N 21.08-22.35, E 99 53-101.80. Five nature reserves have been set up in this mountainous area to preserve the tropical, subtropical forest ecosystems and biodiversity. But increasing population with increasing demands for foods, fiber and others is now threatening these five nature reserves. As a result, the villagers go deeper and deeper into the primitive tropical forest. From 1965 to 1988, forest coverage (including primitive forest, rubber forest and so on) had decreased from 46.46% to 33.72%, with an average of 0.55% annually. In the 1995, the primitive forest coverage lowered the rate of 27%.
Although a lot of urgent and important protecting work needs to be done in Xishuangbanna Nature Reserve, the establishment of the spatial management information system is put to the priority. This priority become to base for developing short and long term financial and personnel staffing plans for the protection of tropical forest. Remote, as tools of the information management and analysis technique, have been applied for evaluating and protecting natural sources and environment ; see for instance Y. Jim, Lee (1987) using Landsat TM to analyze Cygnets habitat along the coast of British Columbia, and R. Aspinall (1992) using GIS and Digital Elevation Model to map the Chequered Skipper and Curlew distribution and migration in Scotland. Furthermore, Youngynt Trisurat (1992) applied GIS to manage nature reserves in Thailand.
In This paper, for the sake of needs of the preservation and management of the tropical forest in the natural resources, at first, we complete the spatial database through the integrated way of Remote Sensing, Geographic Information System and Sampling. Secondly, based on the spatial database, some spatial models have been systematically built in special on synthetic studies. Finally, due to this project's running long in Xishuangbanna, we not only focus on the protection of the tropical ecosystem and biota, but also study a way to harmonize the relationship between the local villager's socio-economic development and the protection of the tropical forest in nature reserves.
2. Study Area
In this study, the study area mainly lies in Mengyang Nature Reserve, the largest one of the five reserves in Xishuangbanna, between the Xiaohei stream and the Mekong River. Its total area is 118,410 ha and the elevation varies from 550 metes to 2250 meters. The forest vegetation types mainly are comprised of seasonal rain forest, mountain rain forest, monsoon forest and evergreen broad-leaf forest, etc. At the same time, some applications have also been implemented in the other four nature reserves such as Menglun, Mengla, Mankao, Shangyong.
