Simulation of land use/cover change scenarios in Karst mountain areas

Taking Maotiaohe River Basin in middle part of central Guizhou Province, southwest China as study area, the land cover change under different scenarios in the coming 10 years was simulated by CLUE-S model. Considering the present land use pattern and the macroscopic factors influencing land cover change, four land cover change scenarios, i.e. ecological security scenario, food security scenario, economic development scenario and also all-sided development scenario, were designed with the support of CLUE-S model, the possible spatial changes in land cover under four scenarios above were respectively modeled. Results demonstrated that there were perceivable differences between the land cover changes under different scenarios in the coming 10 years in Maotiaohe River Basin. Under the ecological security scenario, the eco-environment quality could be improved to large extent in general, but the food security would be threatened. Under the food security scenario, the food supply could be guaranted, but regional eco-environmental quality would go down. Under the scenario of economic development, construction land demand in economic development could be paid enough attention to, but food security would be damaged due to lots of high quality cultivated land occupied. The all-sided development scenario considers simultaneous all the economic development, ecological conservation, and also food security, and is more reasonable than others.